


out of my imagination

by plotracer



Category: Formula 1 RPF
Genre: Hurt/Comfort, Jos Verstappen's A+ Parenting, M/M, Slow Burn, Soulmate AU, original 2020 calendar
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-10
Updated: 2021-01-02
Packaged: 2021-03-07 19:20:43
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 23,406
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26892829
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/plotracer/pseuds/plotracer
Summary: In a world ruled by the memories of your soulmate, Max tries to find the one who is his source of light.
Relationships: Charles Leclerc/Max Verstappen
Comments: 6
Kudos: 104





	1. healing of destruction (Max's POV)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [thalia](https://archiveofourown.org/users/thalia/gifts).



> This soulmate AU is dedicated to my friend Thalia.  
> I'm really happy that I have met you and that we share the same weird thoughts.  
> I had fun writing this even though you had to wait for a while :D
> 
> I hope you're not crushing my hand too much, if your favorite driver is getting a podium tomorrow (when we are not freezed to death by then, screw the german weather here).

**[-CHINA** , 19th April **-]**

Charles. With his dark circles under his eyes, he reminded him of the black tire marks Max had left on the asphalt from time to time due to previous driving errors in the go-kart - they looked out of place. He eyed him once, from his pale face down to his brand-new racing shoes, and back again. There was something about Charles that Max could never put into words.  
It was fascinating, but not an admiration. He could not describe it any further than he could explain the phenomenon that dared to happen again and again in front of his eyes at night. Complex scenarios, which he hoped nobody would ever find out. 

It was the world, no, someone else’s life. 

In technical terms it was called soulmateship, but Max described it as: forced-attachment-syndrome. It wasn’t meant to sound bitter, but when you thought about it, you couldn’t help but fall in love with your soulmate. Fate really pushed you to it. 

The pallor had still not disappeared from his thin face, even after he tried to penetrate the bloodstream of his skin with his hands like a madman. Charles looked really devastated.  
Max wanted to ask him to stop because it was really difficult to watch. He felt the need to grab his hands and tie them tightly behind his back so that he could not disfigure his face. But there was this invisible barrier that prevented him from interacting more with Charles. Their conversations usually didn’t go deep enough. Max felt that both of them were holding back their words, so as not to spark much discussion, as if they were still 14 years old and on the karting track.   
Sometimes just a quick glance in Charles’s eyes was enough and he felt that he had the arguments stuck in his throat, that he wanted to spit them out, violent and ruthless, but something kept holding him back. It was the same with Max. His assumptions were based on pure speculation, but when his head felt so hot again and Charles showed a wrinkle too much on his forehead, he was almost about to lose control. Charles just couldn’t be different on this point, he thought. 

The qualifying session was followed by the race the next day and if he had only spotted Charles briefly at the driver parade earlier, he could say that his condition didn’t seem to have changed. His thoughts circled around the question, why Charles looked so miserable.   
In all the years in which Max had been working in motorsports, he had never seen a driver on race day who was so mentally unprepared, but also delivered such a great result the day before. Max shook himself internally and concentrated on reality. His thoughts went too far. He didn’t have to focus on the mental state of his competitor. 

\---

Second place. Podium. Charles: 3rd place.   
Max hadn’t seen him in his rear-view mirror in the last few laps. He was busy chasing Lewis from whom he was only a DRS opportunity away, but the yellow flags in the last five laps didn’t make overtaking possible. He was frustrated with himself, because his first thought was a crash from Charles. He didn’t know if he was right at that time, but he was wrong. Astonished, he got out of his car in the parc fermé, took off his helmet and decided not to jump up in the air euphorically. The victory had slipped too close through his fingers. He looked even more surprised when a red Ferrari drove next to him. Number 16. How?   
Charles didn’t take off his helmet until they were in the cooling room. Max gave him a careful look to examine his physical condition. The helmet print appeared in red streaks on his face. The hair stuck to his forehead from the sweat. He looked like anyone sitting in a racing car pumped with adrenaline for an hour and a half. Maybe the hormones had done their job. Max grabbed the ice-cold water bottle and tossed it to Charles, who nodded in his direction. He avoided eye contact. 

\---

When Max dreamed at night, he saw the world through different eyes. The memories of his soulmate then passed through his mind. He was lucky because his dreams made him feel safe every time. He loved to dream at night and to be able to trust that his soulmate had not yet had any traumatic experiences that he had to deal with in his subconsciousness. Max could always assume that he would have a heart-warming family story, dreams of cozy moments under the covers, with a mother who pampers him, family trips to the sea, a harmonious get-together and a bliss that overwhelmed him to be allowed - at least mentally.   
Max wasn’t too concerned about what his soulmate had to dream about. He couldn’t think of much: his childhood was characterized by asphalt, engines and the smell of petrol. If his soulmate was not into motorsports, then he must have had problems dreaming about it every night. The other one probably already felt giddy from driving so fast around. Maybe he even annoyed his significant other with it, but the guy was surely not his soulmate for nothing. He would have to get along with Max’s obsession, otherwise they wouldn’t be meant for each other, would they?   
The dreams burned into people like films. They should help you figure out who your soulmate was. This morning, too, Max could remember his dream down to the smallest detail. Each time he woke up, he took five minutes to analyze what was happening. If he had to summarize the dream in a few words today, it would have become “favourite food”. It seemed to be rice with chicken and peas, even if the peas were not one of them. But his mother apparently loved to serve vegetables with every dish (especially green vegetables) and his soulmate loathed the little green balls. His mother insisted, of course, that whatever came to the table was eaten. After eating the meat (apparently always first), Max had searched all dream long for a way to eat the peas without really having to taste them. The solution was to shovel a pea and a lot of rice on each fork, so he didn’t have to perceive the disgusting taste. 

His other half had really strange habits. 

  
  
  
  


**[-MONACO** , 24th May **-]**

Somewhat a home-GP. The weekend was pretty relaxed for Max because he didn’t have to worry about renting a hotel or getting jet lagged. The stress was limited. It wasn’t that he had to rush, but the short walk to the race track made him leave his flat quite late. He swallowed the last bite of his lunch, potatoes with salmon (the go-to meal at the moment), grabbed his keys and sprinted down the street. He was glad that the distance between his flat and the garage was short.   
The briefing was coming up - quite a relaxed matter. Max had no points he wanted to complain about, so he sat down calmly on one of the chairs that was still free. Five minutes later and the room filled up. Max let his gaze fly over the crowd and noticed that the seat two seats to the right of him was not occupied yet. He checked the drivers again and noticed that it was Charles. But he had no second to think about it, because suddenly a guy dressed in red came rushing into the room with a plate in his hands. Max couldn’t help but chuckle. He was probably not the only one who underestimated time. The Ferrari driver settled down stressed, the cutlery almost fell to the floor, but he had good reflexes. 

The briefing began, new track limits were discussed, unnecessary curbs and more. Max had a hard time looking attentively today. His eyes laid on Charles, who took his chicken on the fork and stuffed it into his mouth. The portion of rice with chicken and peas reminded him of his dream and he had to smile as Charles waited with the garnish until he actually got all the meat off the plate. Instinctively, he had to think of his soulmate, who would now continue to pick up the peas one by one and choke them down with a lot of rice.   
When he watched the Monegasque like that, however, the grin passed again. Charles seemed as pale as he was a month ago at the China GP. After all, he had no dark eye bags. Occasionally, his pretty eyes kept looking up from the plate to make sure that he wasn’t just here for dinner. 

\---

Charles was the last to come into the room and the first to leave again. He was stressed - but he left his phone on his chair. Max just stared at it. Should he…? His hand was faster than his thoughts and he grabbed the phone. The guy was already clumsy, not that he would look for it everywhere later. After the room had emptied, Max got up from his chair and ran out the door, when he awkwardly collided with someone. Charles had run into him full force. 

“Sorry, I didn’t see you. I just wanted to see if I left my phone here. I was sure I put it in my pocket-” 

Max held it in front of his nose. 

“Thanks, Max.”

It burned in his soul. In the hallway light, Charles looked more troubled than in the briefing. 

“Is everything okay with you? You look pretty exhausted lately.” 

Max crossed his arms in front of his chest and leaned against the wall. He scanned Charles. His face was not only beautiful, it was super attractive, even with all its flaws. Perhaps he was fascinated by how Charles’s blue-brown eyes captivated him, or how innocently he shrugged his lips. Max turned his attention back to his sense of hearing when, to his surprise, Charles actually answered his question without dodging. 

“I stopped taking my C.U.T. pills.”

Charles was vague, but Max was shocked by only this one sentence. He glanced at the Monegasque stunned. Charles left Max alone with his thoughts. He looked after him in horror.   
Anger rose in him. C.U.T. was a medication to suppress soulmate dreams. They were taken as sleeping pills, but they were only allowed to be taken for five months in a row. With this way, Charles would never find his soulmate. On the other hand, would you actually want to find your other half at all, which was responsible for such terrible dreams and made you swallow unnecessary pills to find peace? Max wouldn’t want to find such a person. The soulmate had to be a real troublemaker, probably even liked to torment his certain significant other - Charles.   
According to Charles’s appearance, it had to be a horrific soulmate. Max realized how lucky he was. His dreams never made him feel afraid or anxious. He sometimes even forced himself to nap at lunchtime, hoping for a soulmate dream. He often felt even more tired after them, but when he dreamed of a beautiful memory again, he was sure that it was worth it. 

  
  
  
  


**[-FRANCE** , 28th June **-]**

For Max it was always clear that his soulmate had to be a male. He didn’t see a girl at his side. If fate paired him with a girl, he would not be sure if he could ever engage in a soulmateship. He was simply attracted to men, had a hot make-out session here or there, but he lacked that feeling, which made him believe that in this very moment he was doing something incredibly right with the right person. Finding someone, who was his last thought in the evening and his first thought in the morning. A person whom he could trust blindly, who was more like him than himself and who could read him like nobody else.   
A person with whom he could share happiness and suffering, joy and sadness, anger and fire. Sometimes he wondered if this person even existed. Max could hardly imagine that his soulmate could not be sympathetic to him. Judging from his dreams, he must be his perfect missing second half. He had always hoped for a stable family relationship, as it happened to him in his dreams. He questioned if his soulmate would find him likeable based on his own memories summed up in dreams.   
And then he had to think of Charles. How his dreams tried to destroy him and how he wanted to destroy his dreams. Charles could only hate his soulmate, at least Max would not show any sympathy towards him. He couldn’t imagine what it must be like to be tormented by dreams all your life, to the extent that you physically resembled a wreck. 

Max turned off the television. He paid no attention to the film anyway with all his thoughts. He preferred to close his eyes and dive into his safe world. 

_The living room was brightly lit. He looked out of the terrace door and saw the birch leaves swaying in the wind. His hands were sweating. He had planned something, something big, but he had no clue why he was so nervous. The blood pumped through his body, his chest set the tone. He wiped off his wet hands on his jeans and entered the dining room with deep courage. Two pairs of eyes watched him, wrinkles formed and he glanced into smiling faces. However, the warmth did not pervade him._

_“I have to tell you something.” He stared at the joints between the tiles and hardly dared to look up._

_“Honey, you can talk to us about anything.” He walked a few more steps closer to his parents, until the distance became uncomfortable because he didn’t know how they would react. His heart was pounding in his ribcage and he rubbed his hands on the denim textile again._

_“Mum, Dad. I don’t want to get married later.”_

_“That’s completely okay-”_

_“No, no. That’s not the point.” He only needed this one sentence to get him going._

_“I will not introduce you to a girlfriend. I think men are more attractive.” He had a hard time swallowing. For the first time he dared a look into his father’s face and could hardly stand the eye contact. He leaned back in his chair and carefully folded the newspaper, he had opened._

_“Phew, I have to let that sink in.”_

_“This comes as a complete surprise to us.” His mother’s eyes were a mixture of dismay and surprise._

_“Yes, I didn’t want you to notice anything, because I didn’t know how you would react.” He brushed a strand of hair out of his face._

_“Well, now we know which wood you are made of.” The corners of his father’s lips just shrugged for a moment. Then he got up, patted his son on the shoulder and disappeared. The feeling was neither complete satisfaction nor dejection. It could have gone better, of course, but it was enough for him to just be accepted. He didn’t need more._

Max was a little confused when he woke up. It was the first dream that left a bitter aftertaste in some ways; maybe because his coming out was not going so well either. On the other hand, he was glad that his soulmate could only be a man.   
He shook his thoughts away. He didn’t need that distraction before a race. 

\---

When he met Charles on the way back to his motorhome, an oppressive feeling spread in him. It felt like he should feel guilty or show pity. Max didn’t question that feeling at all, just smiled at him. 

And Charles gave him a heart-warming smile that reminded him of all his familiar dreams - Charles really smiled again. 

  
  
  
  


**[-** **HUNGARY** , 2nd August **-]**

  
Actually, Max shouldn’t have been surprised that the likelihood was very high that the two would book the same flight sometime. Of course, he hadn’t seen him boarding, but now that he had a perfect view of his seat neighbour, he realized how strange it was that this situation had never happened before. The business class had twenty seats, but fate chose row 3 seats C and D.   
Charles looked at Max as perplexed as he looked at him. Outwardly, however, Max didn’t show that he was caught off guard. He put his bag down and made himself comfortable in the armchair. If all else failed, he could simply simulate fatigue and sleep the approximately two hour flight. Assuming, Charles would believe him that he had to catch up on sleep at 10am for such a short flight. But what did the Monegasque have to worry about him?

Max watched him, as he involuntarily emptied half the contents of his backpack for the second time. Charles' dark eye bags didn’t seem to be out of place anymore. They were fitting him now just as much as Max his blue racing suit. In fact, he hated himself for this thought, because nobody should have the signs of tiredness so succinctly written on his face. It should always be a symbol of poor health and exhaustion, not an aesthetic accessory on the face. Charles eyed him. He suddenly felt naked. Bared in front of his opponent’s eyes. He was wrong. Simply wrong. Max had gotten so used to the blue shadows that he now found that they had faded - penetrated in Charles’s skin and disappeared. Perhaps to a place that had far worse effects than his physical image - his psyche. Max felt uncomfortable. Suddenly, remorse overcame him again. He turned away. 

“Stop looking at me like that, Max.” The latter just glanced at him aghast. Max shook his head and put his headphones on. He didn’t have to give in to his chatter. What did he dare to interpret his own looks without knowing what he wanted to say?

“Am I not allowed to use my eyes?” Max shook his head again. 

“Your eyes are full of pity. You were the last one I expected to condemn fate.” Charles frowned and shoved the items, with more force than necessary, back into his backpack. 

“At least, I don’t play with it.” Max tore off the headphones. His veins were heating up inside. These damn C.U.T. pills. Of course, he would have killed Charles’s soulmate himself if he were Charles, but he found it equally unfair to his other half, to minimize the possibility of getting to know the Monegasque. His mindset was based on controversy, he knew it. Charles groaned loudly and then dropped into his armchair next to Max. With a momentum, he threw the backpack over again, but this time he gave it no more attention than a rolling of his eyes.

“Tell me, how do you deal with nightmares then?” The expectation in Charles’s face seemed to nearly kill Max. The naivety for an answer that could solve all of his worries, an answer, which made him sleep through. The sad eyes that stared at his lips as if he were afraid, that he wouldn’t be able to absorb all the words. 

Max didn’t know. He had no idea how he would react. 

Max never had a nightmare. His life was not destroyed by someone else’s memories. His soulmate only enriched his life. He wanted to put the world in front of his feet yet if he only knew who it was. He knew that his soulmate had no effect on his own memories, but fate seemed to have sent him to give Max a lightness, something weightless in his otherwise leaden life. So how would he react if a stranger made life hell for him and penetrated his subconsciousness, while turning everything inside out and upside down?

Max was speechless. Would he have considered taking the C.U.T. drugs if he were Charles? He didn’t let go of Charles’s eyes, which weren’t filled with anger or frustration anymore, but blank. Max couldn’t help answering him. He couldn’t take the last hope from Charles. Throwing the Monegasque back into a corner, into the dark hole he seemed to be in, knocking him over like his irrelevant backpack. Max rummaged in his thoughts and searched for an answer. He thought of his last dream, which hadn’t felt as pleasant as his usual dreams. _His_ coming-out. He could find something positive even in this dream. He knew that his feeling had been right all along, that his soulmate had to be a man. You could draw something positive out of everything, Max was absolutely convinced of this point. The day would always come after the night. You could learn out of challenges.

“I try to draw something good out of everything bad, a lesson or so.” 

It hurt. 

First off, the look in the glassy eyes that suddenly laid in shards, like mirrors that were boxed in with a fist; then the insight, that Max had now taken everything from him, a last spark of hope for help. He didn’t ask why he considered him to be the last person to save him. He accepted Charles’ decision to make him the last glimmer of hope, even if he couldn’t honour this title. 

“A run of the mill phrase.”

“It wasn’t meant that way-”

“And what if you can’t take anything good out of your dreams?”

“That does not exist.” He saw Charles swallowing down the words he wanted to say, but for Max this conversation was over. Every setback moved you forward in a way - he knew that. 

**[-SINGAPORE** , 20th September **-]**

Singapore. Max loved Singapore particularly, because he was forced to take countless naps during the day due to the jetlag, which meant a lot of space for dreams. He wanted to get to know the world of his soulmate better, wanted to be able to read him like no other and was certain that the moment when he would realize who it was, was filled with the greatest bliss. The more he thought about it, the more he noticed that he should think about soulmateship much more consciously. After all, not everyone had nice dreams, he was aware of that now. Max may have had the greatest happiness on earth with the memories of his soulmate and actually he couldn’t imagine said person to be unhappy in any way or even struggle with his psyche due to his delightful memories. But one person who struggled with the soulmate concept every day was the red-clad boy. 

He remembered their first meeting this weekend, which was only three hours ago. It struck him like a kick in the face, when he saw his pale skin, which had never been more contrasted to his bright red racing suit before. Indeed, Charles looked worse than that weekend in China when Max first noticed his sick look. Didn’t anyone else notice it?

Right. Charles was forced to make short naps like Max. With the difference, that Charles was by no means longing for the memories of his significant other. He would rather take drugs to avoid suffering.   
Max didn’t know what it was, but he couldn’t get Charles’s story out of his head, it just haunted him. He hadn’t heard from him all summer break long and he had to admit that he was slightly worried about his condition and mental health. Max had never seen Charles as a weak link in the covenant, he was a tough boy, he had proven that enough in his karting past. But even if Charles only felt half as many emotions as Max did, when he dreamed of his soulmate, he would rather not know whether the Monegasque could not also be broken sooner or later. 

Broken, hurt by his own damn soulmate.

Max shook his head violently and concentrated on the opening elevator door. When he drank three or four glasses, his thoughts were out of control. He overthought every snippet of his past and interpreted entire series of novels into it.   
The obligatory “bing” sounded, the elevator came to a stop and he fished his keys out of his jeans jacket pocket.   
He stepped into the hall and looked again at the keychain bearing the number of his room - just to be sure.   
Oddly, Charles showed up whenever Max thought about him. He was standing in front of the door next to his own hotel room, cursing and spitting out swear words. Nothing that surprised Max, but the fact that Charles and Max had been room neighbours for three days and he hadn’t noticed, baffled him. 

“Charles? What are you doing?” Max stopped abruptly, still paralyzed by the thought that he was so focused on himself the last three days, that he didn’t realize Charles was next door. He wondered if he heard him scream the night before or at any point, because of his nightmares, but all the time he assumed the room next to him wasn’t booked and it was just some kids screaming outside of his window. 

“I’ve been trying to open this stupid door for ten minutes now.” Three curses followed his answer. Max could no longer watch him massacre the key and lock. 

“Let me try.”

“The key is crooked.” 

Max held the key in the dimmed, warm hall light and saw the mishap. He tried to bend the key, but it was impossible. 

“So if I were you, I would have gone straight to the reception. Did you sit on it?” Max asked humorously. Charles pressed his lips to a narrow line. Max tried more force. He felt Charles’s eyes on his hands. 

“Congratulations on your race win today.” Max thanked him somewhat irritated and paused his actions. “I’m really uncomfortable with this key problem here and I would really like to invite you for a drink, because you are helping me with this nonsense here, although you must be tired.” His lips formed a sympathetic smile. Max didn’t want to allow the thought of it looking cute.

“Thanks Charles, but I’ve already had enough alcohol today. I don’t want to overdo it with the 7 o’clock flight tomorrow.”

“I also thought about what you said on the flight to Hungary.”

“Let’s not discuss that in the hallway.” Max took his key out of his pocket again and opened his hotel room. He needed to talk. They could also take care of the key problem later. The Monegasque was not particularly fascinated by Max’s room. He thought Charles was the messy type of guy, because he often acted clumsy. So it was no wonder that he paid no attention to the clothes on the bed or the still closed curtains on the window from the night before. At least, he hadn’t scattered his clothes all over the floor. Max grabbed two jeans, a vest and his Red Bull shirt from the bed and packed them in his suitcase. 

“I still have champagne in the fridge, if you really want to drink it.” Charles shook his head vehemently. Admittedly, he now looked less like “let’s get wasted”, but rather like “shut up and listen to my two hour talk about why I’m a failure”. Max didn’t approve of this look. 

“Then tell me what’s going on.” He asked Charles to sit down on the bed next to him, because there was no couch in the room. It didn’t bother him. Apart from sleeping and showering, he had no other activities to do in this hotel room. 

“You may be right. I see everything too negative. It’s just so damn hard to focus on the good when your dreams are just terrible.” His head was lowered. Charles played with the loose thread on the bedcover. If Max hadn’t had his soulmate dreams in his childhood, there wouldn’t have been much light in his life. He used sleep to escape reality, while Charles used reality to run away from his dreams. Max recognized this common ground only yet. He let him keep talking, tried to make eye contact, but Charles stubbornly looked at the white duvet. Max wondered why Charles suddenly had such an urge to talk but it only benefited his own thirst of knowledge about his condition. 

“I don’t know why I entrust this to you, but you’re the only one I talk to about it and maybe you want to listen to me.” Max’s “Yeah!” came out of his mouth like a gunshot. Charles still paid no attention to him. “I know you will keep that to yourself”, he took a deep breath, his eyes fixed on the white wooden ceiling, “my soulmate is male. I found out a few years ago. That was the first dream that didn’t make me feel completely crappy. I really felt better afterwards. My soulmate has had so many bad things happen to him, he must be a true fighter. I really feel for him.” Max listened carefully. The trust Charles put into him, while telling him about being homosexual in a sport that didn’t tolerate this, overwhelmed him.

“It was a stupid situation. He was on the computer and didn’t realize that his father was standing behind him looking over his shoulder.” Max’s heart stopped. He suddenly felt so warm that he had to open the balcony door. For the first time since Charles entered the room, he exchanged a look with Max. 

“Charles, what are you dreaming about?” Max had to gather all his courage to ask this question. Charles bombarded him with stories, he knew by heart, every part of his body hurt again, where a fist had once flown. He saw the tears building up in his eyes but they didn’t fall down his cheeks. Charles’s voice cracked here and then, his sad eyes shimmered in the light and his face expressions stung Max right through his chest.   
It was Charles’s memories that made him feel like he could finally take off his shoes after a long, hard day, as if he had finally found the solution to a tricky math task, as if he could finally let go.   
He owed Charles the dreams in which he laughed with his parents until his stomach hurt, in which he got breakfast in bed on his birthday, in which he could do the things he wanted to do, without getting weird looks.   
It was him himself, who he wanted to beat up, because he had done him all the suffering. All the hatred that Max stoked against Charles' soulmate, was directed at him.   
It was himself, who made Charles's nights a nightmare and the day an whole overthinking process. 

Charles Leclerc was his soulmate and Max felt like a criminal. 

And after all the destruction, Max had caused in Charles, the Monegasque felt only one emotion: compassion.   
Max felt like vomiting. One of these creepy, frightening anxiety attacks started inside of him. He hadn’t had one in the last three years. The tingling in his limbs heralded the misfortune. His throat scratched like sandpaper. 

“I’m trying to contact the room service for your key problem now.” Max gave Charles a glance. He just really needed his time now, but his plan didn't work out. The high, annoying voice on the phone, explained that the caretaker would not be available until 6am in the morning. Max definitely wouldn’t write a positive review on the hotel's website about room service. And since he referred to Charles as his buddy on the phone talk, he couldn’t talk himself out, when the woman took it for granted that Charles could sleep at his room tonight. The secretary had to be joking, but she hung up in no time. 

“What a service! This freaking idiot. You have to sleep in my room, the caretaker won’t come until tomorrow morning.”

“Are you kidding me?” Charles took one of the two pillows on the bed, knocking the rhetorical question out of his face. “Incredible.” 

Max gave him an apologetic look. If only Charles knew, Max was his criminal. The guilty conscience seemed to take him more and more to the edge. When he went to the minibar to get two bottles of water, he noticed his fingers trembling. His anxiety attack was evolving. 

“Nothing against you Max, but I’d rather fall into my own bed now.” Max didn’t resent the Monegasque. Still, he didn’t regret taking him to his room to talk. He had found out more about him. He gave him the water bottle and sat quietly on the mattress, before laying down. Max switched off the bedside lamp. As his sense of sight got limited, his sense of smell increased. He could make out Charles’s own scent, which let him tremble a little less.

When the silence returned to normality, Charles whisper broke the small wall that had been established by the calm between the two. Max heard the duvet rustle and could see a bit of Charles’s outline. 

“What are you dreaming about, Max?” His sentence was full of curiosity, so Max wondered if Charles was considering to even think about falling asleep. 

“Why are you so interested in that?” The bedcover rustled again and suddenly Charles seemed so close, that Max could feel his breath on his skin. The surprising unphysical contact triggered goosebumps in him, even if Charles hadn’t really touched him. Even in the dark, he could feel his eyes on him. The anxiety still ran through his spine, he trembled uneasily again. 

“I’m talking so much about myself, but I bet that I’m not the only one struggling. I mean, only if you’re comfortable telling me.” Out of nowhere, Max’s body felt like he would break. Shivering waves overcame him and he knew, if he didn’t take a sip of water now, he would simply throw up. He almost drunk half of the bottle empty, until he was 80% sure that he won’t make an entire mess out of the situation. Max clearly didn’t want Charles to think that he was the only one being challenged by his soulmates’ memories. He had no intention in making Charles even more fragile about this topic.   
When he thought about it, it all made sense. Charles's weird eating habits are something, not everybody would develop. It was exactly like in his dream. Back in Monaco he would eat the meat at first, then swallow the vegetables with enough rice, noodles or whatsoever.   
He knew more about Charles, as he would ever find out in thousands and thousands of conversations.   
He knew what went on in his head, what he overcame in the past, what he learned out of his experience and how his relationships with family members and friends were built.   
He was aware of his biggest insecurities and his favorite places to travel to - and soon Charles will know that his terrific soulmate's childhood memories were Max’s. He had the intention to show Charles that he really wanted to answer his question, that he was interested in holding a conversation with him. He just didn’t know how. 

“I’m dreaming of many wonderful family moments, bad days and good ones. Even though loneliness takes part, there is always comfort added to it.” Maybe Charles didn’t even want to hear that he suffered in his dreams, which he definitely didn’t. Perhaps, he wanted to listen to somebody that told the complete opposite, so he knew that hope was still existing. That there was still a good part about the soulmateship and that the system wasn’t doomed. 

Charles’s voice dropped. “He must be a lucky person then.” Max nearly choked on his words. 

“Out of my imagination, I think so.”, he eventually managed to say. Charles stayed silent for a short amount of time, then he added: “Don’t be surprised, when I scream in my sleep. Just...just wake me up when this happens.” Max agreed. 

\---

The scream that went through his spine, only started two hours later. It was a horrific sound. Max pictured Charles moving restless in the bed, whining and crying. However, he didn’t think that it would be _that_ bad. The Monegasque couldn’t find peace, shaking and trembling. It reminded Max of his first really bad anxiety attacks, he had. 

The boy next to him, started slapping the mattress and everything that wasn’t safe from his own movements. He heard him heavily breathing, gasping for air and when he immediately swung his upper body up, Max had enough. He thought of possible ways to wake Charles up but in the end, he held it simple.

Max turned on the light, tried to catch his wild arms at the wrists and pushed them into the mattress. Then he called out his name. Once, twice. The realization hit Charles when Max lightly slapped his cheeks.   
He opened his eyes in horror but before a scream could escape his mouth, Max shushed him with his palm. This man really dreamed his memories, replayed all his suffering and sadness in his mind. Charles freed himself from Max’s tight grip and hid his face in his damp hands. If Max didn’t know better, he would assume that the emotions overcame him or he was embarrassed.

For the first time he also thought about the consequences this situation had for Charles. Of course, Max imagined this evening to be different, a nice conversation with Charles but then he could go to sleep, having his bed for him alone. Instead he got a panicked Ferrari driver with anxiety issues and whatsoever. However, he thought differently now.   
Was Charles even able to have sleepovers? Afraid of having a big nightmare and waking up everybody? Afraid that it could limit him forever and ever? Never having fun on holidays, trying to escape the chance to have to sleep with other people in a room?   
Max’s hand itched, where he had touched Charles’s wrists. 

“Don’t.” He reached out to make Charles show his face again. Not even the light could reach through his dark eyes. 

Max never thought that he would have such a power over somebody’s mind. Charles seemed to be captivated in the aftershock of his nightmare. Max was devastated because he didn’t think that Charles’s dreams would have such an extent. He only ever imagined that his soulmate would dream of race tracks, tyre marks and that his only failure would be not winning. He completely ignored and repressed the consequences of him losing a race. What had he done to Charles? He was the last person that would have deserved a broken soulmate like him. Not entirely broken, but like a destroyed vase, the fractions were held together but you could definitely make out the cracks, the unevenness and roughness.

Max stayed silent. He couldn’t bear the burden of guilt, he had to carry for now on. Not now, when Charles had opened his heart to tell him all of his secrets. An open heart was just too prone to break. 

“I’m sorry, I woke you up.” Max didn’t say anything. He concealed the fact that he couldn’t even fall asleep with his body shaking and his running mind. Charles sighed heavily. Max felt it through his marrow and bones. The weight on his shoulders nearly crushed him. Max wanted to condemn the forced-attachment-syndrome. He had laughed about the forever ironic meaning, he attributed to the term, but now he really held grudges against fate. 

“Don’t be sorry, this is not your fault.” Max could almost not look him in the eye. For now, he also didn’t want to hear what he dreamed about, too afraid of it being a trigger. “How are you dealing with it? Do you need anything? You want to distract yourself?” Charles's eyes gleamed, they weren’t as dark anymore and Max could finally make out an eye color again. The other just shook his head and brushed with his fingers through his messy hair strands.   
Max hesitated a second but then considered asking.

“How much time must pass until you can take the C.U.T. pills again?” No, he wasn’t a fan of this idea, but he finally understood that bearing with his own memories without bursting was almost impossible. It was better when Charles didn’t have to suffer. 

“You clearly don’t know much about C.U.T., do you?” Max really didn’t. He never knew anybody who had to deal with these drugs. All he learned in school was that it was the last thing you would try to make life less suffocating for sufferers, when dealing with traumas of their significant other. His teacher never educated him about the dosage and the consequences. Swallowing these pills was so far away from Max’s imagination that he didn’t think this information was necessary for students to know - the schooling system seemed to think the same as schools didn’t teach about it in general.   
Max sat up a bit to give Charles his full attention. 

“I can never take these pills again. The negative effects are too high. You need a special permit to buy C.U.T. and they will register you in the database, so you won’t be able to buy a second packet. They are pretty dangerous to even consume, not only are you manipulating fate, no. I won’t go into detail, but they can change your personality and cause disorders with your emotionality. You would mutate into a heartless, emotionless monster. And what would life be without emotions?” 

Max swallowed thickly. In his entire life, he pictured the soulmateship as a blessing. A wonder that added meaning to everyone’s life, no matter how hopeless it seemed. But Charles taught him better - and Max was shocked at his own naivety. 

“So that means you have to suffer endlessly?” Max wanted to reach out to make physical contact with Charles but something stopped him from doing so. 

“I can only hope that there are brighter memories from my soulmate ahead. Not only for me, but most importantly for him. I’m dreaming this horror but he experienced it with his whole soul.”

“I’m sure, he escaped his vicious circle. And if not, one day he will and you will be part of it.”

Charles gifted Max with a heart-warming smile. Maybe, he will realize that he wasn’t as hopeless as he thought. Max would be too happy to be the person who showed him the little spark worth fighting for. 

\---

The alarm went off early. Max woke up after a good one hour sleep. They had fallen asleep after talking through the whole night. They had ticked off the soulmate topic and chatted about everything except racing. Charles didn’t seem to have had a second soulmate dream, because his face was relaxed and Max couldn’t remember hearing a scream. His heart hammered against his ribcage as he observed the sleeping beauty. 

Max packed his suitcase with the remaining stuff that laid so messily around in the room. He put the shoes neatly, which Charles had taken off before laying into bed and pushed the curtains aside. The morning sun was still hiding behind a few skyscrapers.   
The duvet rustled and Max turned to have a look at Charles. The latter answered with yawning and stretching. 

“The caretaker will come in twenty minutes, Charles. I would have said, you can stay here, but I have to check-out and catch my flight.” Charles was immediately on his feet, shoes on and coming towards Max. 

“Thank you.” Charles's face expression softened and all Max could think about were his mesmerizing eyes. They held eye contact which would be considered a bit too long for his usual liking, but Max didn’t care for now - not when it was his soulmate. Not when he knew that there was more to Charles’s ‘Thank you.’

  
  
  


**[-RUSSIA** , 27th September **-]**

When Max crossed paths with the red-clad boy, he felt a burden dropping off his shoulders. His full body signalized pure motivation and something, Max hadn’t seen for months in him - energy. Charles’s whole presence was simply enlightened. The skin shined like clear water when the sun was kissing its surface. As if Charles had left the horror in Max’s lonely hotel room. His eyes didn’t seem tired at all, like he had a proper sleep after a long draining journey. 

Max made a step closer to him, so he could reach after him and wish him a good race. Charles returned his gesture with smiling eyes and an almost giggle. Max didn’t need a ‘thank you’ or ‘you too’. It was enough for him to see Charles in such a bliss. 

\---

Ferrari’s golden boy won the race with a three second margin. Due to a suspension problem, Max wasn’t able to catch him for victory. He wasn’t amused about this fact, but he knew it was his own mistakes, which led to the defect. The urge to be up-to-date with Charles’s physical and psychical condition ruled over the fact, he hadn’t won. Again, Max was conscious about the value of the soulmateship. Racing accompanied him his whole life long. He wouldn’t have thrown over his goals so easily for a normal person, but it was Charles, he talked about.   
Charles was thrilled. His behaviour was back to its old self again, passionate about competition, his aims and beliefs. In times like these, winning a race with still adrenaline in your veins, he would act like a teenager on drugs: the feeling of happiness and love, relaxation, closeness to other people; feeling awake and activated with increased body awareness. If Charles hadn’t looked so healthy on the outside, he would have considered him, having taken a pill or two. But he knew Charles from his karting years, a large part of his personality hadn’t changed since then. Max could only speculate, why Charles had such a change in his whole mood. His glowing skin told him that his soulmate had enough sleep, that he wasn’t feeling like a wreck or even resembling one. Exhaustion wasn’t written all over his face anymore. His nightmares must have decreased. 

\---

Max attended the afterparty. The itchy walls of his mind forced his will to do so. Because he cared for his soulmate, his curiosity was justified - at least that was what he told himself. Max went to a few afterparties each season, but definitely not to all. Sometimes the people got overwhelming and his anxiety started kicking in. It wasn’t as bad as in his childhood, but from some demons you couldn’t get rid of entirely. Small parts of those creatures just couldn’t be killed. And so his heart rate went a bit higher, when he took place on a bar stool, alone between complete strangers. It was 9pm, the party only started yet, but he was certain that Daniel or any other person, he could have been accompanied by, wouldn’t make it until 12am. Either way, this didn’t stop Max from ordering his first glass of alcohol, even more, it was a nice distraction interacting with the barkeeper than sitting there alone with an overthinking mind. The faster he was drunk, the less his anxiety thoughts would bother him. 

Charles was already at the party. The winner was always one of the first people to walk into the party location. Today was no different. Max observed Charles from a safe distance. He was jabbering with some people, he had never seen. If Charles were his enthusiastic self, Max believed that he couldn’t hold back his excitement to tell him about the reason for his mood change.   
Was he sitting weird on his bar stool or why was a random guy suddenly staring at him?   
Max ordered two vodka-red-bull shots and emptied the glasses immediately. His heart was pounding against his chest. He took a deep breath and exhaled loudly. Max’s eyes captured Charles and didn’t let go of him. The golden boy was indeed honouring his name, warm lights beaming at him from the ceiling and benefiting his facial features. Charles’s black shirt laid on him like a second skin. His presence looked tanned and veins poked out of his arms. Max stared at him amazed. With his head up high in the clouds, he didn’t realize that Charles was suddenly standing next to him, plus two strange eye pairs that were watching them. 

“Hey, you really hit the bottle today, hm?” Charles placed a hand gently on Max’s shoulder blade. He gazed on the counter, where a few empty glasses were standing. “Let us join you. These are Martha and Dennis.” Max only nodded towards the two impassive people. He wasn’t attending this party with the intention of making new connections. 

“I should buy you the first drink, winner. Choose one.” Max handed Charles the list with the abundant offer. 

After they had spent each other at least three drinks, Max noticed that Martha and Dennis had taken a seat near the pool table. They might have left Charles and him alone for quite a while now, but Max hadn’t noticed, because he was fully focusing on the blue-brown eye pair in front of him. Charles laughed a lot, his eyes got nice wrinkles, everytime he started giggling. Occasionally, he sent out these sparks of joy, Max tried to capture with his senses. When Charles got excited, he raised his voice. If he spoke about something more serious, he slowed down and wrinkled his eyebrows. It wasn’t difficult for Max to read his body language.   
He noticed that Charles was like an open book. He couldn’t make a poker face, all his emotions were laying quite obvious on the surface. It was one thing, Max realized after their flight to the Hungaroring. How Charles expressed his hope with every inch of his body, every cell and every look, he gifted Max. And then the crashing of his voice, the disappointment in his eyes, as he hadn’t been given the answer, he had so dearly clung to. Max tried to forget about the guilt he felt after having let down his soulmate - just for the moment.

“Instead of celebrating with my team, I’m sitting here, babbling you with stuff, you might not even be interested in.” He clearly wasn’t sorry about that, because his smile got wider, but Max didn’t even want him to feel that way. This conversation was the reason why he hadn’t run away from this crowded room already. 

“You can go and party with your boys.”, Max turned away from Charles and searched for the Ferrari people. He then noticed that he wouldn’t even know more than three faces, without them being clothed in their red shirts and trousers. 

“No, it’s fun gossiping with you. If I have one more drink, I might even start flirting with you.” Charles’s eyes gleamed in the colourful LED light. 

“Then I should get you one more drink.” Max leaned over the corner to get the attention of the barkeeper and bought two shots, before Charles could interrupt him. The latter took one and clonked glasses with Max.

“I didn’t think you would be such a charmer. Maybe I should bend my key again.” The wink let Max nearly choke on the liquor. Max wouldn’t say no, and he was far over the point, where his common sense was active enough, to stop him from going any further. And then it happened again - eye contact that was way too long to be considered appropriate. Max felt his body heating up as Charles’s eyes darkened. The latter put a hand on Max’s leg and squeezed it slightly. Max gulped. 

“Tell me, what has changed in these seven days?” Charles tilted his head curiously and looked him closely in his eyes. “You are so...vivid again.” Max laid his hand on top of Charles’s, which was still caressing his leg nicely.   
He wondered if he could ever experience this warmth, that Charles’s palm sent out, from his heart. If Charles could ever open his heart to trust him, even though he kept silent about the soulmateship. If Max could ever come this far to hearing Charles saying that Max fulfilled his life; that they fought for each other.   
If Charles could ever forgive him. 

“My dreams got so weird - not in a bad way! I hadn’t had a nightmare for five days now.” The excitement of Charles’s voice gushed through Max’s spine. He was right, Charles’s nightmares have stopped - and they wouldn’t come back, he knew. No creeping back of the punches and slaps, he had to take, either. No more worries about the smallest of failures, the tiniest step aside of an unspoken line he had overstepped by accident. No bruises, he had to cover up in his childhood, while others had fun swimming in the sea. No more overthinking sentences a million times before saying them, without worrying about the consequences. Max was free now and so would be Charles. 

“Oh Max, I have to inform you about my last dream. All hell broke loose for this guy.” Charles started laughing like a mad man, but Max didn’t care. He was delighted to see him this happy and enthusiastic again.   
Max tried to remember which story would follow, but there were too many memories he was embarrassed of. He expected a story about his first sexual encounter and hoped that his cheeks wouldn’t turn red. Unfortunately, it turned out to be a way more embarrassing memory, Charles had dreamed about. Max listened through the whole story, as if he didn’t know it by every word. He focused on Charles’s facial expressions, how his eyes showed happy wrinkles and how his laughter made Max’s heart beat faster. This guy was worth all the struggles he went through. 

After they drank another three shots, Charles started squeezing Max’s thigh again but adding to that, he seemed to stare right through his soul at the same time. Max was close to losing his sense. As Charles raised his eyebrows too, Max intertwined their hands.

“How would you find it, if we go to a less crowded place?” Some soulmates were really conservative when it came to sexual interactions with a random person. They wouldn’t so easily agree to this question if they didn’t know who their significant other was. Max never had an issue with that. He respected the decisions of these people but he didn’t follow this rule himself. First off, because he wanted to make experiences before meeting his soulmate to not fully fail. Secondly, because the possibility that the random person, you were making out with, could be your soulmate, was never zero. The only thing he was ever slightly afraid of was that he might fall in love with a person, which wouldn’t be his soulmate. That would have been an entire betrayal to his own fate and faith. Max believed that he could only experience true love with his soulmate. He was lucky, he never came in such a situation, where he felt more for a random person or the other way around. Yes, Max didn’t fall in love with somebody yet, but the feeling of this warmth right now could only be real with Charles by his side. He was uncertain if Charles was one of these people that waited with everything before they met their soulmate. If so, Max would have a big problem. How could he confess to Charles without saying that he was his hurting soulmate? Without saying that he was the one that brought him these terrifying and disturbing nightmares, which wouldn’t let him sleep and compromised him in what should be his most glory experiences? Max didn’t think he could ever be okay with that guilt.   
Charles closed his eyes, then opened them again and said with his brightest smile: “I knew you were a risk taker.”  
Max wouldn’t deny that, but he didn’t understand the meaning of his answer. The only thing that was clear, was the agreement. Was Charles referring to the conservative behaviour some people had? Did he think that Max was brave because he asked for a quieter place to make out with him? His soulmate just grabbed his hand and Max had no chance to escape – he wouldn’t even want to. Every cell of his body got magnetized by Charles’s admiring presence.

As the door went into the lock, Charles crushed his lips heavily on Max’s. The latter felt the hard, wooden door behind his back, but all he could think of was how dominant Charles seemed to be. Max interrupted his kiss to fully appreciate the others face with all its flaws and beauty. He wasn’t in for a rush. Charles needed to be admired, he was in fact his soulmate. Max gazed at hungry eyes, the complete opposite of the feeling inside of himself. He had nothing left in him but pure adoration. He never wanted to see these blue-brown eyes in pain again, this hopelessness without any spark inside of it. The disappointment he held towards fate for gifting him with such a broken significant other. Max wondered, why Charles never held a grudge against him, never got angry. The only emotions he could read from him were nothing but wallowed in sadness. Charles slowed down in his motions, caressed Max’s arm gently, as the other touched his cheek nervously. Maybe Charles expected Max to be wild, impatient and rowdy, like he was on racetrack. He didn’t judge him for these thoughts, but the soulmateship was so special to Max that he didn’t want to hurry things without appreciating them. Not the rushing, Charles was after, to satisfy his desires. If only Charles knew that Max was his soulmate. Would he act differently?

Charles chuckled and leaned in to press his raw lips on Max’s. He tasted the vodka on Charles’s tongue, the lust and impatient feeling of excitement. It was like lightning chased through him. Max led him to his bed, both crashing ungently on the hard mattress. He immediately started to lean over him, showing his affection with quick kisses, he spread all over the Monegasque. The latter hummed softly against him. It was a sound, Max could get used to. Charles’s hands started brushing over his back. He stroked over the fabric of his shirt, then underneath it. Max froze in his actions as Charles’s fingers touched his skin and his mind started searching for an escape out of this situation. His soulmate ran his fingertip over this specific point, he shouldn’t have ever come across. Max instantly regretted all his decisions he had made in the last few hours that had led to this moment. Charles was a curious boy, he would definitely want to find out about it.   
But as Max glanced back in his eyes, his heart stopped. He had already dreamed about it. He pushed Max away, not rudely but also not with the softness, he had caressed his skin before.

“Charles!” Max tried to grab a hold of his arm, but Charles freed himself in no time. He slid down in front of the door and hid his face with his hands. Max wasn’t sure if he started crying or just muttered indistinct words. He really had no idea how to deal with this situation as he hadn’t thought that it would come to this that early. Max tried again to call his name, but his soulmate just started to resemble a wreck again.

“Why didn’t you tell me? Since when do you know about it?” It hurt to hear his voice crumble with each word coming out of his mouth. The guilt hit him with full force.

“I couldn’t believe that I was the cause of your suffering! Do you know how much guilt I carry in my heart?” Max tried to keep calm but he failed. He sat down next to Charles on the floor and grabbed his wrists, so he wouldn’t hide his face anymore. Max begged him to look in his eyes, but Charles didn’t risk raising his head so he continued talking to him. “All this time I thought, my soulmate would dream about racing, the smell of a karting track, the winning feeling, the competition. But when you opened up to me and told me about these horrific nightmares…I was so shocked, Charles.” The addressed one breathed out loudly. “I am so sorry.” Suddenly, Charles's eyes met Max’s.

“Don’t. Don’t be fucking sorry. It is not your fault. I wanted to tell you that everytime you started doubting yourself…every damn time.” Charles almost shouted. Max didn’t expect Charles to be that desperate about his message, he wanted to send out.

“But how? You never experienced a glimpse of happiness with my memories, I didn’t benefit you in any way. I only did you harm.” Now Max was the one that started to curl up into a ball. He didn’t search for pity, he knew that he learned out of his past and that it was true, what he had told Charles: you could always draw something positive out of the negative. However, Max’s fear was loss. Losing his soulmate forever, because of his terrific childhood.

_The voice of Max’s dad thundered through the room, bounced off the walls again and hit him like a boomerang. It was not the first time, his father caught him researching for his soulmate; but the first time, Max made the stupid mistake to actually spend money on one of these ‘search & find organizations’ in hope of getting coupled with his soulmate. He invested his whole pocket money, he won on the race weekends in the F3-series. Of course, his dad wouldn't be amused if he found out – but he didn’t have to find out. Unfortunately, he did. Max was used to his tantrums, used to the punches and fists, he had to take occasionally. But this time, he definitely knew that he had crossed the line one step too much. Normally, the arguments would start with silence. Max lost count on how many hours his father had ignored him because he was angry with him. Then Jos would say something really offensive, aiming at Max’s feelings and emotions. The vocal fight would develop shortly after that, with Max barking back at him. First, his father would box some random objects, then Max’s limbs. _

_However, today was different. Jos didn’t wait until he confronted him with swear words and judgement. All hell broke loose as he came home with a stack of bank statements. Max instantly knew that he was in huge trouble, but he didn’t think that his father would check his bank account until the end of this season. In fact, his dad was furious. After a few words, the first two hits landed in his face. Max immediately pressed his hand on his cheek, but his father caught his wrist, before he could do so and beat him a third time. Max was stunned by the sudden amount of fury that rushed through Jos’s facial expressions._

_“I told you to stop with this nonsense and concentrate on your career! I am putting so much effort into you and you are destroying it with your…with your shitty soulmateship crap. Focus, boy! Focus!” His father grabbed a hold of his chin and forced him to look into his raging eyes. His face was so full of hate, so much negative energy that Max couldn’t stay calm himself. This ‘crap’, his dad spoke about, was indeed his soulmate, the most special thing for Max in this world. But for his father it was no more than a pathetic distraction from racing._

_“What do you love about me?”, Max screamed as loud as he could with his father’s hands around his jaw. He could see confusion in his eyes for a few moments, at least he imagined that._

_“You are never happy with what you have. Never showing gratitude! You need to have your voice, but you don’t want a voice, you just want to fucking complain about not having one!” Instead of blocking his jaw, Jos now knocked over the chair behind him. Max didn’t even flinch anymore when he did that._

_“See? You are gaslighting me again! In every damn situation you can find!” He was sick of talking against a wall. Max viewed the dishes that were still on the table from their breakfast this morning. He simply forgot to do them. His father fully exaggerated his hand gestures and if his vocal cords weren’t smashed yet, they would definitely get fucked in no time, if he continued with this tone._

_“You idiot don’t get it, do you? Each time you fail winning…you don’t want your soulmate to know what happens then, do you? I will give you motivation to focus on winning again, believe me!” Jos punched on the surface of the table again, but this time so hard, that he knocked over a glass with orange juice, which Max hadn’t drunk out. “You really think your soulmate would like to get to know you? After all the mistakes you made? Who would want such a loser?”_

_“No, he won’t know about all the things you did to me, I will make sure of it! You cannot drive a wedge between him and me!” As the words had left Max’s mouth, he immediately regretted them. What was far worse than talking about the soulmateship with his dad, was the fact that Max knew that his other half was a male. Wrath coated Jos’s whole spirit and within seconds, he grabbed a plate from the table and smashed it at Max. The porcelain only broke when it hit the floor. But Jos picked up the shards. Max wondered if he had ever seen anyone stir up such hatred. “Are you gonna hit me again? Show how much you love me?” The answer wasn’t long in coming. The shards cut into his skin merciless. Particularly strong on his chest. His shirt got blood soaked. It turned red on the area, where the brand logo was. Like all the pain in his heart escaped out of that cut. Max couldn’t believe what just happened. He swallowed thickly, before looking up at this man’s face. His eyes hadn’t changed a bit. Max didn’t know if his father cared right in that moment, but he wasn’t silly. His wound had to be stitched. As Jos showed no reaction in whatsoever, Max scanned his arms and noticed lots of small scratches and tiny cuts. It didn’t matter to him._

_All that mattered in this moment, was the realization that his dad would try everything to make his soulmate’s dreams hell. Max was determined to change that. He was certain that if he focused on positivity and didn’t let his father’s abuse rule him, his soulmate would be okay. Because love was a stronger emotion than rage._

“I failed as your soulmate, I am sorry.”

“Max, I almost know every fight you had with your father, how you defended me every time, how you believed in the soulmateship with a complete stranger. I know that you tried to shield me off the fights. Unfortunately, it didn’t work but therefore I got lots of faith in you. You are so strong.” Charles stood up and started pacing around in the room. Max knew this habit of him, he attempted to find the correct words. “I was in such a denial when I decided for the C.U.T. pills because I thought I let you down. But I couldn’t take the physical and emotional harm anymore that your father did to you because of me. I couldn’t deal with the guilt anymore, it started to break me.” Max watched as Charles came to a stop in front of him. He stood up and got lost in his blue-brown eyes. They sparkled with the same naivety, back when he asked for a solution for his nightmares. But this time, he was certain that he could give Charles the conversation he needed. All this time, Charles was supporting him. Even when he took the pills. Max doubted that Charles would still be here if he hadn’t decided for a break from these horrible nightmares. He saw Charles’s broken self after he had stopped taking the pills. The happier he is, that Charles will dream less and less of this bad time in Max’s childhood and teenage years. Because the more you get to know your significant other, the more present the dreams will get. At some point they will get both to a zero point and start making memories together.

Max laid his hands on Charles’s shoulders. “I’m not angry or disappointed at you for taking these pills. Indeed, I wanted to punch your soulmate in the fucking face when you told me about your situation.” Charles giggled slightly at Max’s words and reached for his cheeks.

“I was never holding a grudge at you for giving me these many sleepless nights. I’m just so happy that the nightmares seem to have stopped.”

“Yeah, my adulthood is a way more pleasant time, I can tell you.” Max chuckled and let Charles kiss him a second time. He felt like the whole conversation had made him sober again. He noticed Charles’s scent, he first paid attention to, in the hotel room back in Singapore when they were both laying in Max’s bed silently. He was aware of Charles’s fingertips that were fondling his face and a few seconds later grasping after his hands. Max intertwined their fingers, as he did earlier that night in the bar. Charles spread out such a warmth that Max started to feel dizzy, as their tongues touched. He couldn’t believe that Charles had had such a hopeless mind that his soulmate wouldn’t like him because he got beaten for only thinking of fate existing. And Max being in a denial for believing that Charles hated him for all the suffering he had done to him. 

But he was right in this regard, love was stronger than any other emotion.


	2. fire and ice (Charles's POV)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Charles's dreams are finally getting less violent but they turn into something, he is even more afraid of.

**[** \- **MONACO,** 23rd February **-]**

  
  


The dreams came and went away again. Some of them stuck in his head for a few days, then he forgot about them, others nested into his mind like a virus. The memories of his soulmate weren’t as violent anymore as they used to be. Charles coped with his dreams quite well, actually better than ever, when Max was lying beside him, always there to clarify any question or worry that came into his head after waking up. He would then lay an arm around his waist and pull him against hisself, making sure that Charles was aware of Max’s body heat. It was a simple gesture but Charles just felt a lot more comfortable, when smoothing words were underlined by physical touch. He longed for explanations after experiencing a heating argument or the heart-ache his soulmate felt during fights with his so called father but Charles made progress. He wasn’t dreaming about fistfights, physical abuse or manipulation anymore though Max still struggled with the aftermaths. 

He wasn’t the greatest talker as Charles wasn’t the best advicer but they still managed to have decent communication about Max’s past. Maybe it was the fact that Charles always was a part of Max’s past, Max’s problems and couldn’t be erased from his childhood. Not Charles particularly, but the idea of him as a soulmate.

Of course they had the same fights as every couple in the world, whether it was Max not doing his assigned household chores or Charles acting unfair towards his significant other, when he had a bad day. All in one, they had a pretty normal relationship going on, some disagreements here, some stupidity there but in the end of the day both could sleep next to each other in peace - without a running mind keeping them awake. Charles appreciated Max’s ease with which he handled jealousy. He just wasn’t bothered by any approaches from strangers on his boyfriend at all. Instead of getting mad at Max for not seeming to care, Charles actually was proud that his soulmate trusted him so much. He welcomed Max with the same portion of trust but he showed it in a different way. Charles shared every dream with Max. The first question in the morning wasn’t “How are you?”. It actually was: “What did you dream about last night?” And while Charles loved to hear Max speaking with his gentle voice, reminiscing about the warm feeling his boyfriend gave him every sleep, they both focussed more on Charles’s dreams. Not because Max’s memories were worth more but the latter insisted on Charles telling him every detail so he didn’t have to carry the burden on his own. Charles had no other choice but to spit out every tiniest piece of memory, because Max was really persistent and stubborn once he had his mind set on something. 

\---

The alarm went off way too early. Charles fidgeted around nervously. The otherwise so cozy pillow underneath his head felt uncomfortable warm and suffocating. He had an urge to smack it into the next corner. With grumbling, he opened his eyes to the still darkened room. A few sunrays peeked through the space, where the curtains didn’t close properly. But they weren’t shining into his face and blending him; instead they got lost in the room. Charles laid his eyes on the figure sleeping next to him - at least _he_ seemed still drifted out in the world of dreams. As he obscured Max’s face that got half hidden by the duvet, his heart felt a bit dull. He turned to his back to stare at the ceiling. The doubts and worries started to gnaw at him. It was not an usual dream he had, most of the time he dreamed about Max’s older hook-ups, but their dreams started to become more present lately, as they had found each other as soulmates. On the one hand it was beneficial for Charles, because he didn’t have to deal with Max’s horrific memories of all the things his father said or did to him. But on the other hand, Charles wasn’t too sure if he should be too pleased about that, if it meant that his dream tonight would cause him way more brain damage. It was a different kind of overthinking. 

He didn’t know this man, he saw through Max’s eyes in the dream. Hadn’t met him in all the times he fell asleep, which could only mean that it must be a new contact in Max’s life too. The guy was handsome, Charles couldn’t lie about that, brown curly hair, piercing eyes, full rosy lips and tattoos - lots of tattoos. His white shirt laid tightly against his chest. But it wasn’t the appearance that made him suspicious about his dream - it was the conversation he had held with this guy. The familiarity with which he had chosen his words and the trust that laid in the other guy’s eyes confused Charles even more. This curly-haired dude really had the audacity to confess to Max. He made him a fucking confession. And then his shitty alarm went off, smacking him back into reality without knowing more context. He wasn’t sure how Max reacted, what he said and how this ended. The last thing he could remember was Max touching the other one’s arm and taking one step closer. Combined with the feeling that this wasn't their first encounter, it left a bitter taste. 

Charles decided to put the negative thoughts aside and attempted to concentrate on the present. He had to take a shower, eat breakfast and then do an online meeting with his team. Yes, a well structured day would help him focus on his duties. As he stood up from bed, he hesitated for a moment if he really should kiss Max’s cheek as he did every morning. But it wasn’t right in his opinion to act differently because of a dream, which he couldn’t fully judge because of missing pieces, he couldn’t put together. So Charles leaned in for a kiss, maybe he pulled away a bit too fast but at least he stayed loyal to his morning routine. Max’s lips curved upwards and Charles’s heart jumped again uncontrollably. 

As the day passed, his thoughts tend to flow in a completely opposite direction than he wanted them to. Instead of focussing on his toast not getting burned in the toaster, he went through the scenario in his head again, how Max made him look at this tattooed boy, how gentle his words left his mouth and how he grasped the arm. Instead of paying attention to his online session, his thoughts drifted away every chance they got. He was not the master of his mind today. After the online session ended and Max laid his arms around Charles’s shoulders and gently pounded on his chest, the thoughts were more suffocating than ever. He made the decision: if he really wanted to live in peace, he had to take a nap now. He just had to hope that the dream would continue, when he closed his eyes. Charles never did that. He did never take naps voluntarily because the soulmateship hadn’t gifted him with the most beautiful dreams, he could imagine. Even though his dreams developed, Charles was not ready for more nerve-wrecking dreams, if they only evolved around Max’s interaction with completely strange people. 

“Charles? Hello? Somebody in there?” Max knocked on Charles’s temples. Only then he got caught out of his running mind. Charles grabbed Max by his wrist and turned around in his chair to look up at him.

“Sorry, what did you say?”

“I said, I want to tell you a story from a few days ago, it’s actually pretty interesting.” Max’s fingers started playing with Charles’s collar. 

It annoyed Charles. He leaned back so Max’s hands were hovering in the air. 

“Not now, Max. I want to take a nap, I have a headache.” 

“Oh, are we not in a good mood today? Okay, then. I’ll let you rest.” It was only then, when Charles noticed that Max had brought him a plate of pasta for lunch. Max’s tone wasn’t the nicest and Charles could just tell that he was a bit huffy. Even though the ‘headache’ was just an excuse, he felt his head start hammering. He finished his meal, while Max’s steaming risotto remained untouched on the table. 

Charles laid down on the sofa, the pillow underneath him still uncomfortably squishy. It just didn’t pass the vibe check with the situation going on at the moment. If Charles weren’t so uncertain of his dream, he would laugh about how ridiculous he was, that a pillow got him so angry, because it was cuddly. Anyway, Charles wasn’t even thinking about changing his look. He was pissed. This whole day could be flushed down the drain. Charles closed his eyes. He just needed to fall asleep again, he just had to. He had to know what was going on with this conversation - with this pretty guy. If he just were ugly...maybe then Charles would pay less attention to this topic.

A few minutes passed but Charles's mind was circling around Max’s potentially unloyalty. And if it weren’t enough, Charles made one big mistake: trying to nap in the living room - at noon. When all neighbors thought, what a good day it would be to mow the lawn. With loud frustrated grumbling, he turned on his back and looked at the ceiling. This would not work. Pissed off, he stood up and shambled to the bedroom. The walls in this room had a better isolation and were especially reinforced, first of all because of Max’s light sleep. So it was the perfect room to be shielded from any annoying outdoor noise. What he didn’t expect was Max relaxing on his side of the bed, hands grabbing tightly around his PS5 controller. Would it be possible for Charles to get his nap today? 

“Max, could you please play in the living room. I cannot nap on the couch with the noises outside.”, Charles whined. 

“No.” Max looked uninterested. Due to his sulkiness from earlier, the conversation had ended here. Charles just couldn’t believe it. Max had no reason to be this offended. 

“I have a headache Max, just go on the other television and play there, please.” 

“I am in the middle of a session right now.” Charles cussed loudly, walked out of the room and slammed the door shut. 

  
  
  
  


**[** \- **MONACO,** 27th February- **]**

  
  


The storyline of the dream didn’t come back the next few days. Instead he got haunted by the image of the guy every night. 

But Charles not only focused on his dreams and the impact they had on his mind. The worst part was when he noticed how different he acted toward Max. How the diversity of their ways of showing affection decreased, how Charles had to fight with himself to give Max a peck in the morning, how he himself started to shiver under Max’s contact even though he longed for it. These fingers had caressed not only him but an other guy that just looked like Charles in a cooler version. Why would Max not just swap him out already?

Charles feared the moment, when Max would watch him with other eyes, the sparkles fading away, everyday a bit more, until dullness would glare back at him; Max slipping away under his grasp, no matter how hard he tried to cling on to him. He couldn’t even imagine what a world without his soulmate would look like. 

With stomach-ache-causing thoughts, he fell asleep after two long hours. 

_“We will just continue our search and find your goal, trust me.” He gently patted his shoulder blade, where he could feel the muscles of the guy tensing and relaxing again, when he removed the hand. Piercing eyes glanced at him with curiosity._

_“I’m sorry, I am just used to - no, never mind.”_

_“I know and it is okay, you know that, do you?”_

_“It’s just...you understand me so well.”_

_“That’s maybe because you remind me so much of Charles.”_

_The guy blinked completely dumbfounded but then a tiny smile showed up on his face. He couldn’t help but smile back. He opened his arms and embraced the body of the other with all the affection he could find._

Charles woke up as he noticed a warm grasp around his waist. A head was snuggled into the crook of his neck and Max’s steady breath tickled against his skin. Max’s sudden outburst of affection got answered by Charles’s body with a racing heart. He couldn’t ignore Max cold-hearted. Firstly, because he loved Max too much to just leave his way of affection unnoticed. Charles wasn’t a monster. He knew how Max had lacked admiration his whole childhood. Secondly, they drifted apart the last few days, focused on their duties but not on their relationship. They had just seemed to have forgotten it on the path of not giving in to the other because pride was more important to protect. They were just two dumb stubborn boys. Charles missed Max’s body contact. He missed cuddling and falling asleep in Max’s arms. He missed the little lovely gestures they exchanged with each other during the day in their everyday work. He missed the whole easiness with which they handled each other usually. 

And even though Charles seeked for Max and how his heart ached the last few days, he couldn’t just give in to him. 

The dream he had this night was another reason why he couldn’t just act like everything was okay between them. Max kept a secret from him which could be even bigger than he imagined it to be. 

„Charles, I don’t know what’s on your mind but I feel like you are...you are avoiding me lately.” Max removed his head from Charles’s neck and looked him straight in the eyes. Charles noticed how his boyfriend had tensed as the words had been spoken. In this short moment, Max looked way too fragile for Charles’s liking. His eyes were fixating Charles like it was the last chance to target the prey before dying of hunger. Of course, he hadn’t had an answer for all the questions that his heart had to carry around since these specific dreams. But some inner voice told him, he had to find out on his own. Maybe otherwise he would only get to know half of the truth. Was he really questioning Max’s honesty right now?

Now it wasn’t the warm pillow underneath him, nor Max who was laying on him, that was uncomfortable. Charles couldn’t stand himself in that particular moment. He couldn’t stand his doubts knocking every common sense out of his head. 

“It’s just...so distressing at work and developing the car and, yeah. You know how it is.”

Max just hummed and Charles turned toward the wall. His eyes started to water and before he knew it, a tear rolled down his cheek and a sob escaped his throat.

“Hey. What happened?” Max tried to run his palm over Charles’s face but the latter avoided his attempt. As he heard Max sighing and rolling to his other side, something in Charles seemed to break.

  
  
  
  
  


**[** \- **MONACO,** 28th February - **]**

  
  


Charles had never doubted Max’s love towards him. He had never had a reason for worry. As they built their relationship in the end of year 2019, they removed all fears that could have clouded it in the long term or caused any misunderstandings. The first point on this list was erasing all guilty feelings they had carried all along, making it clear for the other one that there was nothing to be ashamed of.

However, as time went by and their relationship evolved, there came struggles which they hadn’t foreseen. Challenges, which would only strengthen the bond between them, they thought. Because now, at least Charles wasn’t too sure about this oracle being true. 

The sun urged his eyes to open. He was certain, he had closed the curtains before going to bed. Now they didn’t prevent the sun from crashing into the bedroom anymore. The bedside next to him was also empty. Max wasn’t a morning person and would never be. It didn’t last long until he got the answer. Charles slightly sat up so he could lean on his elbows and obscure the little tray, Max placed on his lap. As he wanted to open his mouth and comment on this rarity, Max had already started to speak up. 

“I thought it was a good idea to relieve you of a few tasks and cheer you up after yesterday.” He must have taken his failing approach in the night very personally. Charles didn’t know what to say but “Thank you.” Either way, Max didn’t even seem to expect more from him today. He looked pretty content with his try to cheer up Charles, so he just started to eat quietly without paying too much attention to Max watching him silently. The room was filled with Charles’s chewing sounds and clinking of cutlery on porcelain. 

If it hadn’t been Max informing Charles about him taking a shower, he thought he might have been eaten up by the awkwardness. 

The day went on with nothing but household chores and online team meetings. He was glad that work kept him busy and he wasn’t so easily distracted by his running mind today. Work had to be the highest priority for the next few weeks, otherwise the start of the new season would turn into a disaster. It had to be the same for Max, because he crawled out of the living room to join his team meeting at 3pm. They always tried to find seperate rooms to communicate with their team, so no information would be exchanged accidentally. It was one of the promises that must have been kept so the two would have been allowed to move in together. 

Charles immediately closed the tab that would reveal too much information about the aerodynamic of the Ferrari, as he noticed that Max was approaching him. They trusted each other that they wouldn’t sneak away any factory secrets but promises have to be kept and protected. 

Max nudged noses with Charles and gave him a peck on his lips. 

“I’ll go for a run. You wanna come with me?” Charles quarreled with himself. He knew where this question came from, Max wanted to make sure that Charles made breaks between online sessions and didn’t risk to overwork himself. But in the end, the problem was different and had nothing to do with his made up lie about feeling distressed by work. So he declined Max’s offer and opened the tab again. Max got the hint and was in under a few minutes out of the door. 

It was the first time on that day, when Charles could finally breathe out the air, he was holding in unintentionally. His thoughts started to circle around this one tattooed guy, Max had a favor for. The one guy that made their relationship porous, as if it was built out of pillars of salt and pillars of sand. He still felt safe in this building yet, but he questioned how long, if Max gave him more of these brain-wrecking dreams. 

Charles stood up from his chair and closed his laptop. It was time for some relaxation, so he threw himself on the sofa, started the gaming console and let himself be distracted by friends. 

It was almost two hours later, when Max came home again. Two hours. Running wasn’t Max’s favorite type of sport so he would never run longer than an hour, when he was jogging alone. Was he…?

“I brought your favorite donuts, Charles!” He said goodbye to his friends and turned off the gaming console. Max really put much effort into pleasing him. He didn’t know if he should believe his approaches or if they came from a guilty feeling because he did things behind Charles, that should stay secret. Max was more or less confusing him. 

They met in the kitchen as his boyfriend put the plate with donuts and cake down. Max wasn’t a fan of donuts so he bought himself a big piece of cream cake. Charles picked one of the three donuts and devoured it. Even if Max did all of this because of - no. He should stop overthinking. He didn’t know shit. 

Charles handed Max the sharp knife so his cake wouldn’t crumble while cutting it. Max was always a bit clumsy in the kitchen so it was no surprise that seconds after that he cried out. 

“Fuck!” He immediately held his hand under the other so the blood wouldn’t come in contact with the delicious cream cake. They exchanged looks for a short time, Max’s face slowly fading and Charles was almost saying something like “I knew, this would happen.”, when Max stormed off to the bathroom. In the meantime, Charles grabbed after the second donut. 

“Do we have any band aid left?”, Max’s voice rushed through the bathroom walls.

“Maybe I have some in my nightstand.” Charles kept a whole pharmacy in his nightstand, as his significant other would say. 

He put the bitten donut back on the plate and walked to the bedroom. The drawer was so full of blisters and small packages of medicine and pills that it was hard to even pull it open. Charles rummaged through the drawer and stopped - the C.U.T. package. _Just getting rid of the dreams, blowing the overthinking away and...peace_. He shook his head and finally found the package with the band aid. He closed the drawer. 

Charles received a heartwarming smile from his boyfriend as he wrapped the small bandage around. They took their food to the coffee table in the living room and turned on the tv to watch anything to distract themselves from the silence they carried around. But as Max switched through the channels because it was hard to find something interesting at this time of the day, Charles couldn’t hold himself back. 

“Max, do you still get triggered by blood?” The question cut right through the veil of tension. Merciless. But Charles _had_ to know if he was still feeling that way. 

“No.”, his voice echoed faintly. Max’s face didn’t look pale anymore, instead it blushed, something he would only do, when he was uncertain. 

“You know, you don’t have to cover up your hesitation with lying.” 

“Why are you so bitchy about everything I say? I am okay with seeing blood.” And this was it - not being able to put down the pride. Max’s old self was showing, the competitiveness, the pretending confidence, that Jos had trained so badly into his brain. Charles had worked so much on giving Max the feeling of trust, so that he knew he hadn’t had to play tough around him. But the effort failed in some situations and so did it in this moment too. Charles didn’t bother when Max tried to play cool with others but it meant so much to Charles that he put down his walls in front of him and showed his hidden colors. So it was even more degrading, when Max lied about such a personal topic, when Charles was the first person, who would know about his struggles. He just sensed that Max was lying. The echo in his voice after answering, the redness on his face and the dilated pupils convicted him. 

“Also with accidentally cutting yourself? Max, your scar-”

“How can you be so insensitive?” His eyes cut right through Charles. Nothing was worse than Max feeling insulted. The wrath in his pupils flared up and the heat immediately jumped over. 

After Jos had thrown shards on Max during that fight a few years ago, his soulmate had to be stitched. But Jos didn’t bother Max’s shirt being soaked in blood and so it took hours until he saw a doctor. He basically feared bleeding out for what felt like an eternity, even though it wasn’t life threatening. Since then, Max panicked when the red liquor exited his skin layers. He was a person that bottled up his feelings more than anyone Charles had ever known, not even himself. People who didn’t know him would have a hard time figuring out that Max even had a panic attack. He never blacked out from seeing blood but his mind would start a war with itself. 

Charles could believe that Max would wish in these moments that there existed a pill that could get him rid of this assault going on in his head - just like Charles had worshipped his C.U.T. pills, which gave him at least some peace back then. Again, he shook the thoughts about the devil pills away. 

Unfortunately for him, he dreamed about this medicine on the same night. He felt like he couldn’t flee away from its claws, which were digging into his brain like a hungry lion would cling to a defeated antelope. 

It was Max meeting the brown curly haired guy with his piercing eyes, full rosy lips and tattoos - lots of tattoos. This bloody handsome type of guy...Charles was definitely out of competition here. 

And Max really entrusted this fucker his deepest secret, the one he told Max about after the drivers briefing in Monaco last year even though they hadn’t had a connection back then. It just felt right in that moment to tell him about his issue. But since then, Charles had never shared this information with any other, and so did Max for loyalty reasons (expect for Daniel) - seemingly until a while ago. 

Max had really told this dude that he took C.U.T. pills - that he had depended on them. He didn’t know how much he had told him, the dream just evolved then, but this dude was aware of their soulmate secret. Their sweet little treasure, their mourning for each other before they even knew who the other one was. Their thing, which seemed to be their greatest foundation for the bond between them. Max had revealed it. Peeled them naked like a banana. It felt like a punishment for Charles. He didn’t know what for but what were even Max’s intentions in telling this guy?

Max wouldn’t just tell a stranger about Charles’s past issues. He trusted Max that far, that he could assume that Max worshipped their soulmateship, he fought for it more than any other he knew. So Max would only talk about this issue with someone who he truly respected and trusted, which in return meant that this fucker and Max had something going on between them. 

His stomach began to grumble and a ticklish feeling in his fingers started. He wanted to punch Max in his wonderful ass face, wanted him to get rid of this carefulness which followed him through the day, every day - even now that this guy had stepped into Max’s life. 

But when Max placed gentle kisses on his upper body in the next morning and his urge for body contact increased, he felt this warmth spread in his chest again. Charles excused his weakness for his touches because of his own tiredness in the morning, but right now he couldn’t care less that he wanted to punch Max’s face minutes ago. Max continued with exchanging sloppy kisses with him, caressing Charles as if he was to be protected at all costs. Max’s hands were everywhere, where the other would feel pleased. 

Charles' mind went blank, his thoughts circled around Max’s lips on his skin, the weight and heat of his body on top of him and desire. He sank his hands into the blonde hair and pulled harshly on them, letting his inner frustration out. He couldn’t hold his strong emotions toward Max inside any longer. Max would think that he behaved like this because of pent-up lust anyway. His egoistic mind was kicking in. Charles wanted to be satisfied by his significant other, no matter what they thought of each other at the moment. Screw this curly haired guy, screw his horrific thoughts or the longing for the devil pills again. Right now only Max and Charles counted.

  * and Max made him feel like the most precious person that existed in this world. 



It reminded Charles of their first kiss, contrary to all expectations Max was the one that wanted to slowly show his love, while Charles was the one driven by his hormones. The whole day went by so fast and Charles tried to trust Max a bit more with all his efforts, he made to make Charles feel better. 

But it was the old mindset that destroyed the day in the end for Charles. It always had felt as if he fell enormously fast and hard, whenever he would have reached a high. With Max by his side, he had already hit the jackpot but fate seemed to revenge itself. 

The guy had tried to kiss him - his Max. Charles swore to himself that he would break this dude’s nose if they crossed paths anytime. Luckily, they got disturbed before their lips could touch, but it didn’t change anything for Charles. In his opinion Max should have just kicked his ass and left, however nothing like that happened - and then it hit him like a truck: _this_ was the continuation of the first dream. 

His ridiculously tight shirt didn’t escape Charles this time either. The same locker room type location with blue tiles on the wall and a wooden bench standing behind them. Charles had never seen this room in real life. After Max had touched the arm of this attractive looking guy, they tried to kiss. They really did. Max really wanted to betray him. But was their soulmateship nothing worth for him anymore? All the arguments he had fought with his dad, all the times he tried to shield off his soulmate, he didn’t even know back then, from his harming father...was it all washed down the drain because of a guy that looked similar to him? Was Max really that into tattoos and piercings? Charles considered a number of scenarios in his head, if Max was getting bored of him, if he figured out that he expected something different out of the soulmateship or if Max was unloyal all this time and a fabulous liar. 

After this dream, Charles was more confused than ever and his mind exploded, leaving his heart crushed behind. 

However he noticed his arm getting numb, where Max’s head was bedded on. In the background were weird tv noises filling the room with nothing but void. Everything went bland. With his last confidence he squealed out that his boyfriend was crushing his arm, when Max moved his head with a regretful look. A look in his winter grey eyes gave him the illusion of watching the cloudy sky or quarry rocks. And in the middle of it: a small brown spot with the everlasting warmth of a hearth, even though this wood couldn’t burn. Charles got lost again, not in his thoughts but in his eyes, which captivated him without any effort. As if they pleaded for him, even though he didn’t know what for. 

Charles turned to the opposite and ripped off the last string that had seemed to connect them for a tiny moment. 

  
  
  
  
  


**[** \- **MONACO,** 9th March - **]**

Charles hit a certain level of tiredness that equated to insanity. He knew this feeling too good. When he had liked to temporarily dislocate his spirit from his body, as if he could ask a higher power to take him out for a short while and let his soul go.

He didn’t wanna feel the process of recovery all over again. Charles was a brave lad, but he wasn’t sure if he could make it this time. 

The “one night tiredness” evolved to an extent where it was ever present - like it once was just a heavy weight on his shoulders but became heavy bones. The condition became an ingrained part of his life again, that wasn’t lived, but survived. 

When Charles made decisions while tired, he was basically “drunk driving” his life. He definitely wasn’t the master of his mind, rationality kicking in and just focusing on bringing his body through the day without being revealed to more mental stress. Charles was flowing through life for a few days now but he was closer to the edge of sanity than ever. 

He knew the risks. He knew that he would be hurting Max with his decision but it couldn’t get any nastier, could it? Charles would just get this clarified one last time, so he could be 100 percent certain that it was the right decision he was about to make. 

The difference between taking the step forward or not.

Like playing chess and making every decision to win or lose. 

But the force of the outcome would only be discovered in the end - and then it was time to face consequences; which in turn decided whether a soul stood up again or was getting buried under the weight of responsibility. 

Charles already saw his memories like ashes blown away by the wind. Since the first dream about the guy, his mind cycled through emotions faster than a kid flipping radio channels. Being fairly brave was one of Charles’s strengths. He was a warrior, but even the men of war took off their armour once in a while. 

With clammy hands he pushed the door handle down, looking over his shoulder back on the street, as if he could even consider not to make the step into the building of the psychological center. But this was it. His drunk driven self had already taken over the steering wheel. Charles’s will was defeated and the only way out was taking these pills again. 

  
  
  
  
  


**[-** **MONACO,** 14th March- **]**

  
  


Dreaming felt much like taking over the life of somebody else, indeed your soulmate’s life, getting the illusion of having power over every action the person is to make. Being the ruler of the world and the majesty of fate. However, you couldn’t be any more wrong. Dreaming was being captured in a situation you couldn’t change the outcome of. It was suffocating not knowing what was going to happen, which emotion was going to be stimulated, if you would enter paradise or a doomed world. 

When it came to Max’s life, Charles only prepared for cruelty in the past. Emotional abuse, manipulation, verbal fights, physical abuse, hurt, wounds and heartbreak. Max didn’t let him breathe, not even for one night. It was horrific, being in a vicious cycle his whole teenage years. Not being able to make sleepovers, fearing him disturbing his friend’s sleep with loud screaming. Being afraid of the judging looks, of questions about his “horrible cruel soulmate” or other insults against this precious person, that didn’t deserve all of this in the first place and tried everything to prevent Charles from experiencing the dreams. Even though the latter didn’t work out in the end, he never held grudges against his dreams - until a few weeks ago. Charles _despised_ the world which he would enter, whenever he closed his eyes. He could punch Max for causing him headaches, restlessness and insomnia. When he didn’t sleep, his thoughts would cycle around the dreams. The nooses were wrapping around his limbs, holding him, and killing him slowly. 

He put a new package out of his drawer. Charles opened it and pulled out the blister. One pill would do its work, if he trusted his psychologist. Charles was knocked out shortly after. 

_His fingertips hovered over the keyboard of his laptop, not being sure which words to choose. He had been in this position for ten minutes now. What even brought him in this situation to write this email? But he had promised to contact him. There was also a responsibility for him to do this - to bring their paths together. And suddenly his fingers seemed to push the words out of his mind automatically. Choosing them with caution but also with certainty, not missing out on the important parts about soulmateship. Not missing out on getting his point straight, underlining it with all the information he had collected the last few days. Hopefully he would reply and also be okay with a meeting, being open to meet_ him. _The contact with the keys seemed to suck the words out of his head. His whole ambition flowed through his veins, being pushed on the surface by his duty, he had chosen himself. With a satisfied smirk on his face, he sent the email away and turned his laptop off, walked into the living room and prepared lunch for Charles and himself. As he opened the fridge, he saw the leftovers from yesterday. Even though he would have liked to eat pasta today, he decided for the plate with risotto. Charles was just more the type of guy to enjoy pasta, so he should have it._

It was the first time Charles had dreamed about Max’s thoughts of him after being revealed as soulmates. The experience was weird and on the same hand disturbing, considering the circumstance. Charles didn’t have any clue, to whom Max was writing, he didn’t check on the address line, but he was definitely typing about soulmateship, considering the train of thought of _bringing paths together_. Did Max even have a pattern? First off, he contacted a second person, Charles didn’t know, but then he had the kindness to leave the pasta for his boyfriend? The steaming risotto plate came to his mind. 

Charles was fuming again. As if Max had lightened a petrol can inside his heart. The fire robbed Charles of his common sense, melted down his kindness and any self-pity, which suffocated him the last few days. The flame flickered uncontrollably into his mind, burning down his reluctance and hesitation to stay quiet. 

He had had enough of the bullshit dreams, making him all miserable again. Whoever this curly haired guy was...or Max’s new email affair, Charles was determined to give them both a lesson, they would never forget. And Max…

Charles turned to his left side, watching Max rubbing his sleepy eyes. 

“Good morning.”, Max’s voice still sounded like rough sandpaper, “how did you sleep?” He then opened his eyes, these damn winter sky grey eyes, which were so calm, yet so captivating. 

_Yeah_ , with a bit of help, he was fast asleep last night. 

“Shouldn’t you ask what I dreamed about?” Charles’s voice spitted fire. He didn’t care. He wasn’t holding back anymore, even if he let him run against the door early in the morning. Max had a huge secret ongoing and Charles hated it. 

“Oh, sorry. Is our majesty not good to talk to this morning?” Max barked back and frowned, ugly wrinkles showing on his face. The mocking tone fueling Charles’s inner outburst even more. 

“I have all right to be this furious. What do you think you have done wrong, huh?” Max’s facial expression fell down, as if the strings to the puppet had been cut. _Caught you._ Maybe he would try to come up with a good lie now, but Charles knew when Max didn’t say the truth. However, when Max kept silent for longer than Charles’s liking, he furrowed his eyebrows too. This was beyond the point of coming up with a believable lie. 

Charles shook his head and raised his arms toward the ceiling. 

“Are you even trying to come up with an excuse?” Max’s face got even more confused. 

“What on earth are you talking about? You are behaving so differently recently, I made several attempts to get through to you but you block me everytime I try. Just spit it out, please!” The last word just sounded desperate enough to let Charles almost believe that he meant it. But he couldn’t believe it. Max was investigating how much he actually knew about the topic, so he could be prepared for questions. This was so pathetic. All of a sudden it felt so wrong having this conversation, confronting him with the issue but not getting anything out of him. Charles felt ridiculous - utterly ridiculous. 

His burning petrol can was flooded by a huge merciless wave of water, drowning everything in cold ice. A big lump formed in his throat, making it hard to breathe. Charles knew this feeling - it choked him inside. He turned away from Max, bedding his head into his elbow and closing his eyes shut. He pulled the emergency break, forcing the conversation to a stop, however Max was having none of it. 

“I should be the one sulking! When would you have wanted to tell me that you wanted to purchase fucking C.U.T. pills again? Charles, really I-” He let out a loud groan. 

_Please stop talking._ Max’s presence was too much in that moment. He felt pushed into a corner, a dark spot, moist from all the tears he was holding back the entire time due to his emptiness. This state of not being able to feel anything but the void, arising in his heart and spreading like a plague in his entire existence and surroundings. Beloved ones say that they would notice, but every word, he received from Max, was harshly thrown at him. 

“Didn’t he appeal to your conscience? There would have been irreparable damage for your emotions!” 

Right at this moment Charles just wanted to scream that he _already_ felt like he was broken. He faced his significant other and expected his ever so raging face, when something didn’t work out his way. But instead Max’s facial expressions softened, as he got a glimpse of a tear streaming down Charles’s face, quickly getting lost in the dark of the shadows. 

“I suffered so long because of you. How dare you think you have the right to act like you do right now?” As Charles closed his mouth, his heart skipped a beat in shock. He had never pushed guilt upon Max, making him feel miserable about his failed attempts to shield Charles off his cruel childhood and teenage years. He felt something ripping inside of him for the second time. A fiber - just one of the infinite ones, that held their soulmateship together. He wanted to suck in the spoken words again, regretting every piece of it. But a catastrophe has already been released. He didn’t intend to hurt Max like that. Never ever had he wanted to speak such hurting words, knowing too well how destroying they were. Charles felt like all his attempts to assure Max that he didn’t blame him for the things he dreamed, were all crushed in the moment he had opened his mouth. Just like that, his past words were worth nothing. Charles was dumping his promise over a cliff, comforting Max in his guilty conscience. He was wrong, just so wrong with saying crap like that. And even if Max was breaking his heart lately, there was no excuse for him, to let these words so easily slip from his tongue. 

“Max, I didn’t mean-” On the other hand, his boyfriend was acting like a spoiled brat. He didn’t have to be so angry with such a sensitive topic, that affected their whole come-together process. “I didn’t mean to-”

“So, that’s what you were thinking the whole time? I was right. You are thinking of me as a monster, this entire relationship long you were lying, saying I shouldn’t think too much of it, when you were holding me responsible for your life being a nightmare this whole time.” The last words were more blown air than coming from his vocal cords. Max was holding back his emotions, Charles knew that he had hurt this very sensitive spot of him. He never intended to do so. Charles felt miserable. The others eyes were glassy, bringing all emotions to its surface through pressing on the lacrimal gland. Charles pleaded for the tears to pour down Max’s face. Suddenly he was certain that there was more to his emotions. Max was holding back everything, if not the biggest part was occupied by his cheating secret. He just wanted Max being run over by his feelings and spilling the truth. However, he didn’t speak. He was building up walls again in front of Charles, not letting him in his mind. Restricting him from every bit of understanding, potential hope and pity. But Max was letting Charles watch upon an infinitely high construction, not even a chance in sight to catch a glimpse of what was behind. 

“No, no. Max, no. I-I love you. I would never think of you as the reason for all my nightmares. You know that I was afraid that you hated me, because you-”

“Keep the drivel for you.” Max was out of the bed in no time. And Charles's heart? It felt as if shards had been thrown to the ground again. 

Making a thousand shards out of one hundred. 

Doubling his self-pity, doubling his grief, dividing his heartbreak in ten. 

And even though his situation was driving him to a dead-end, he finally felt something: grief.

The mourning was following him the last few days but it was never as prominent as it was now. His chest ached, his mind wasn’t in control anymore, his eyes hurt so bad that he just decided to let his tears flow all at once. Charles was sure that he could fill a bathtub with the amount of water he was wasting on Max now. He felt his throat bobbing from the amount of pent-up sadness, swallowing became a difficult task to manage. It felt like destroying his throat, ripping his head off his upper body. Charles tried to bear the pain but it almost seemed impossible to handle. He hiccuped a few times, being so overwhelmed by his heart beating uncontrollably and his breath overturning itself. Charles had never felt so uncomfortable. He longed for Max’s arms embracing him, his steady breaths and calm heartbeat preventing him from hyperventilating and turning his world to the right side again. Making every issue in the world a small mosquito shit, easy to wipe off. 

_Max._

Max wasn’t here right now. 

Going to a counselor for the C.U.T. matter was wrong. Taking these pills again wasn’t worth it. His love for Max was too strong to not be able to feel anything again. The last months with Max were too beautiful to forget all about the feeling and memories. He wouldn’t put his love on risk because of it - never. 

Max was his everything. The way his face lit up, when he knew he was going to race in a few minutes. How his hair shined golden in the sun, kissed by the sunrays. His eyes which represented the cold frosty weather on a sunny winter day. The thick warm sleepy breath against his ear. His fears forgotten in the harbour of his arms. How he could recognize Max just from his footsteps. The way he kept the food he would like to eat for Charles, because he knew that it was his favorite food. Max’s favor for pounding gently on his chest, whenever he wanted attention from his boyfriend. 

Fate was wrong if it had intended to give them only a few months to bind. 

  
  
  
  
  


**[-** **AUSTRALIA,** 20th March- **]**

  
  


It was quali day in Australia. The first race of the 2020 season and Charles was still unsure if the car would fulfill the promises the team had made. The season started calmly with no big surprises to begin with. Charles felt just as miserable as on the last season start. He didn’t wanna think about what has changed, where his problems originated or for who’s sake he was living. The emptiness inside of him stayed there like an uninvited guest, causing him annoyance and being responsible for faking his mood lately. Forcing himself to smile for the cameras, his team but not Max. He didn’t hide his feelings in front of him, in the hope that Max would register him screaming for help. That his boyfriend would reach out to him, the man who once understood Charles with only a few words. However it seemed that these times were doomed. Adding to the emptiness, there was this grief overcoming him every once in a while. They were the moments where Charles was actually feeling anything again, but he didn’t know how to handle his emotions nor how to bear them. Charles was just so lost that he could easily fall into self-pity again, if there wasn’t his hatred for his dreams. 

He knew why he had accused Max of having these nightmares. In the end the actions were his own decision to make. No father who could be the catalysator for all his bad dreams, no violence, no abuse, no manipulation. Max was behaving on his own, not being pushed by some external force. It was his decision to embrace this guy, his decision to nearly kiss him, his decision to talk with this guy about Charles’s mental damage, his decision to spill all the things that Charles treasured so much. Max had torn down their safety bubble, being completely unarmed against judgement. 

Charles couldn’t talk with Max. The uncomfortable tension was never leaving the room when they tried to talk or have an easy conversation. 

He tucked his shirt neatly in his fireproof racing suit, making sure the zipper would move effortlessly. Even though his mind wandered a whole different path, he had a job to do; people that had certain expectations of him, that couldn’t be let down. Charles was committed to show immaculate results. He put his baklava and helmet on and got into the car that was expected to drive him to the top three. 

Charles quickly noticed that there wasn’t more in it than P5. His Q3 performance was okay, not extraordinarily great but it would be enough to take a place on the grid with potential to overtake a few cars tomorrow. His race engineer told him about one more chance, having the time for one more lap, when he suddenly stopped mid-sentence. “I’m afraid there is a red flag, red flag. Come to the pits.” It was this heart tightening feeling that overwhelmed him every time, when he heard these words. Everyone on track was responsible for his own fate but sometimes other factors robbed you from deciding against risk. As Charles drove into the pit lane and looked at the big monitors, his heart stopped. The car with its number 33 was shunted ugly into the tyre barrier. _Max._ He couldn’t watch the scenery for more than a few seconds, when one of the mechanics called for him to get out of the car, because the session wouldn’t be restarted again. It didn’t bother Charles that his mechanics even had to remind him, when his mind cycled around the fact, if Max was okay. If he was in pain, if he had torn a muscle, if he had bruised his ribs. Charles took everything into consideration, at least overthinking was his greatest hobby besides racing. He only noticed the numbness inside of him was gone, when fear showed itself on the surface. His hands were trembling like crazy. Charles was more nervous than ever. 

The shaking of his veins only came to a still, when he caught a glimpse of Max walking down the hallway of the hotel lobby. It was the first time he actually saw him outside the paddock today. He rushed through the crowd in the lobby, until he catched up to him and pulled on his shirt. 

“Are you okay?” The words just spilled out of him. Max glanced at him in disbelief. There was something flickering in his eyes but Charles couldn’t point a finger on its meaning. Max rolled his eyes and crossed his arms in the front. 

“Lost the car while pushing to the limit, had oversteering, boom, wall. That was it. Nothing to make a drama out of.” While Charles's gaze was concerned, Max watched him with, he would almost say, disgust. As if he hadn’t needed his worry, as if he didn’t even want to talk to him right now. The whole time, Charles was distant, behaving weird as Max would say, and now he wasn’t pleased with attention either. Maybe their relationship was already more destroyed than he had imagined. 

“Didn’t you think I was worried about you?” Charles stopped the eye contact and looked down at the sad washed-out carpet instead. The color was so faded that he could only guess which one it used to be. He bet a bright yellow. 

“At least I am the one who takes care of his body.” The insult hurt. Max had fired the first spear through his flesh. His uninterested look on his face, quickly turned to the angry expression of somebody who figured out betrayal. 

“What do you mean by that?” Charles straightened his posture and clenched his fists. He was ready to argue about the things that hurt him. And there was nothing that caused more harm than the soulmateship between Max and him. 

“I want to say that maybe I am the one that needs these C.U.T. pills. I’m going insane if this continues.” How he could downplay the need of medicine for Charles in the past was incomprehensible. However it weren’t the words that felt like he had run into a knife. It was the ice cold glimmer of his eyes that sent shivers down his spine. A coldness, which froze his veins, giving the illusion of his blood clumping into one piece - stopping his body to function. But the condition didn’t give him the hope of an embrace he needed the most now - Max’s body heat which would melt his icy blood again, haunting for love. 

Max mocked him for considering the intake of medicine again. He didn’t care what it was about, why he had considered to do such dangerous measures. Worry didn’t concern him. There laid nothing but anger in Max’s eyes and Charles...Charles couldn’t even run away. He was an ice block waiting until Max would step away, the raging heat disappearing, so the everlasting iciness could spread on the hotel floor, through the lobby and out to the streets. But Charles’s world couldn’t turn all cold. Not with Max standing there as his only option to save him. He caused this whole snowstorm inside of Charles and was the one in control of it. 

And after everything that has happened, after all the times they had understood each other, known why one took pills in a denial of feeling everything connected to his soulmate and not feeling at all and known why the other kept the soulmateship a secret to Charles in the beginning, Max chose the coldness to rule Charles. 

He stepped away, the heat waves decreasing in their intensity until they couldn’t reach Charles anymore. There he stood and his whole world turned into a cold cruel place. 

  
  
  
  
  


**[-** **BAHRAIN,** 24th March- **]**

Only a single dim candle lit the room. The scent reminded him of sandalwood and herbs, he couldn’t name. Even though the flame reflected a big cone of light on the wall, Charles sat in its shadow. He felt like hiding in his own hotel room, forgetting the whole tumult of crowds swarming airports and being exposed to people all day. The flight had tired his limbs, letting them feel like heavy weights. His muscles ached from the exaggerated training he did yesterday. He had hoped that it would distract him from the fact that Max wasn’t answering any messages or calls from him. He hadn’t heard from him since the incident in the hotel hallway. Max was distancing himself and Charles was on the verge of despair. 

Was that it?

All these hurting words, the frustration, anger, disappointment. Was there even a way back? 

Their soulmateship was shunted into a wall and Charles doubted that it could get out of it unharmed. Something broke, long ago and he had even noticed it in these moments. The snap of fibers that connected them like an invisible bond. The candle started to flicker as the open window door slammed shut. His arm was touched by a cool breeze but he didn’t shiver. 

If the inside of one's heart was an ice block, nothing could compare to this kind of coldness. Nothing could outdo it. 

A tear streamed down his face, then a second and a third. After the fourth he stopped counting.

The worry of Max slipping away, no matter how hard he held his hand was scary. He squeezed nothing but air. Molecules which lacked love. 

As if to imitate the scenario, Charles stretched out his arm and reached for something that wasn’t there. His gaze fell on his forearm, more specifically on his tendon, which danced on the surface as he wiggled his fingers. Pictures of the splint around his arm came to his mind. At first it had seemed like a simple sports injury but it quickly became clear that it was more complex. He wasn’t able to stretch out some of his fingers on his right hand. However the fibers grew back together and he never had any issues with it again. Charles thought about the destroyed fibers in Max’s and his soulmateship. 

After sitting there on the ground for a few hours, he decided to go to bed. His problems wouldn’t fade away and if he was sleep deprived,he wouldn’t do himself a favor. Charles pulled the sleeping pills out of his backpack and swallowed one. 

_The bag of chips laid half empty on the coffee table. Daniel’s hotel room had way more furniture than his room. He wasn’t jealous, he could have rented a more noble suite but he was always minimalistic when it came to his accommodation. His friend finally sat down with him on the sofa._

_“Sorry, that I had to hang off so quickly but I was in a rush to catch my flight. But now you can tell me in peace.” Daniel handed Max a red bull, referring to their phone call two days ago._

_“No worries. So, as I said I really don’t know what to do anymore. He doesn’t even let me get through him. I tried everything but he is angry at me for doing nothing!” He underlined his words with hectic hand movements._

_“Did you do anything that could have annoyed him?” He shrugged his shoulders, but couldn’t come up with anything._

_“Of course we had some disagreements but out of nowhere he got really insensitive with the soulmateship and I know that he treasures it a lot. You should have heard him the last time. He didn’t even tell me that he went to a psychologist because he wanted C.U.T. pills again. I had to dream about it and then confront him with it. And you know what? He made me feel so guilty. He never did this before.”_

_Daniel frowned, took a sip from his red bull and then caressed his temple. Somehow he always had to touch his face, when he was deep in his thoughts._

_“Did you ever put into consideration that maybe it has something to do with his dreams? That his dreams got worse again?”_

_Now he was the one, who had to caress his temple because a headache began to build._

_“We talk about his dreams a lot. He knows that he can reach out to me and most of the time I don’t even have to ask him because he spills his dreams on his own. Moreover, he stopped dreaming about my past. His dreams are mostly about my present experiences.”_

_“Then you have fucked up something and didn’t tell him about it.” A mischievous smirk appeared on his face._

\---

Charles’s alarm clock went off too early again. He would have given everything to know how the conversation between Max and Daniel had ended. Max was really unknowing of what he could have done. But if this dream did anything to him he came to two conclusions. First off, he was more confused than ever. Max was trying to reach out to Charles, but on the other hand he had these strange conversations with this one guy. It was enough for Charles to doubt his trust. Secondly, he had to talk to Max. How could he even be so clueless about what he did? Why couldn’t Max put the puzzle together? 

Max worried about him. He knew that now. He wasn’t trying to squeeze information out of Charles to prepare for believable lies. 

Charles must find him and reveal his dreams. 

He looked at the time and noticed that he had to hurry up. Media day was the worst day during a race weekend but he could only hope for less nerve-wracking questions than the last time. 

\---

Charles wiped off his sweaty hands on his jeans. He was more than scared about the conversation he was going to have. He thought about which lies Max would pull off to defend himself. Whether he would bring it to an end or try to make up his wildest lies. He stared at the small silver shield which had the number 135 written on it. Then his gaze wandered to the door. He tried to find unevenness in it, tried to find flaws in the wooden surface but there were none to be seen. Suddenly the door got pulled open and Charles looked down at his shoes. 

“Come in.” Charles didn’t overhear the hesitation in Max’s voice. The scenery reminded him of the first time back in Singapore, when Charles stood in Max’s hotel room and they had their first deep conversation. Him spilling all his nightmares and Max being silent about it, even though he could recognize his own experiences. A fear built in his heart that he would do the most talking tonight with Max being silent about his secret like time repeating itself. 

Charles stepped into Max’s room. They wouldn’t have to hold their conversation sitting on the bed fortunately. There was a sofa placed on the left side of the room.

“Sit down. Do you want to drink anything?” Charles asked for water so he could get rid of his dry throat, nearly making swallowing impossible. 

After emptying half of the glass he opened his mouth but no words came out. 

“Should I start?” Charles only nodded. “I’m sorry how I reacted on Saturday. I shouldn’t have been so angry but you are acting so weird and I’m so irritated by your behavior.” He paused, met eyes with Charles and laid a hand gently on his shoulder. “If we want to fix this then you have to talk to me Charles. What is wrong?” 

Max’s eyes pierced him. The grey winter sky in his eyes was nothing less than a wild snowstorm. His eyes fluttered in the bright light of the hotel room lamp. It was as if Charles got a sight into Max’s chaotic soul full of misunderstandings, chaos and question marks. His gaze wandered to his hand, which still laid on his shoulder. Max hesitated but removed it. 

“I have no clue how you cannot put the pieces together, Max.”

“Then help me! Spit it out!” His sentence full of frustration, Max’s voice cracked. Charles let out a groan. He glanced at Max fiddling with the lid of the water bottle. 

“This guy with the brown, curly hair and lots of tattoos, who is it?” The question was heavy with accusation. He didn’t know if he could bring up the courage to watch Max’s facial expression changing but he wouldn’t miss any signs now. Not yet when he interrogated him. So he lifted his gaze but what he saw was not the reaction he had expected. Instead of guilt or surprise he saw irritation. Question marks were pushing out of his soul right into his face. It caused a redness on his cheeks.

“You dreamed about Nika?” Yes, _indeed._ He gave Max a few seconds to figure it out on his own but the boy seemed as clueless as ever. 

“Who is Nika? He confessed to you, you had utterly much body contact with him! You kissed him!” Charles’s blood was boiling so much that he had to stand up from the sofa. The coldness was completely gone. No rigidity in his limbs, no frozen heart. If Charles represented an element now, it would be fire. His shoulders started to shake as he dared to look into Max’s widened eyes. 

“Charles, I didn’t kiss him!” Max didn’t even raise his voice. “Did you see me kissing him?”

“No, but-”

“Did you ever feel the urge to kiss him?” It was a simple question. A sentence of nine words with a question mark behind. But it caught Charles so off-guard that he was completely dumbfounded. It didn’t make sense. This guy, Charles didn’t dare to call him by name, clearly leaned in for a kiss. He didn’t even hesitate as if he assumed that Max wanted the same. Such confidence let Charles believe that this wasn’t even their first kiss.

But he was wrong.

No. The answer was no. Charles had never had romantic fantasies in his dreams. He felt like embracing the guy with every affection he could offer, he wanted to make him feel happy again but he never complimented him while he dreamed. He never noticed anything specifically on this guy during the dream. Every thought Charles had about him, was his own after waking up. Max wasn’t crushing on this guy. How could he miss out on such important information? He couldn’t see the wood for the forest. 

Charles gulped. He sat down on the sofa again and was so ashamed that he didn’t dare to look at Max. His shoulders had stopped shaking and the fire inside of him didn’t blaze uncontrollably anymore. He hid his face behind his palm. Gosh, he wanted to bury a hole, jump inside and never come out again. 

“Did you really think that I would betray you?” Max embraced him tightly. Charles longed for Max’s body contact so much that he believed to melt in it. 

After a few moments, Max’s arms still slung around him, Charles whispered: “Could you explain everything to me? You told this guy about me. You mentioned my C.U.T. intake, you even compared me to him.” Charles was glad that Max couldn’t see his face as long as they hugged. 

“I have known Nika since I was 13 years old. Maybe you dreamed about him once. I met him this year during winter training, when his racing team was doing some practice laps. He told me about his violent dreams about a father.” Charles’s body twitched for a second. 

“You have to know that Nika once accidentally walked into the room when I had a terrible argument with my dad. He comforted me afterwards and recently started to imply that I was his soulmate. He started dreaming of depressing moments and a father overplaying a weakness with aggression. I had to help him find his real soulmate also because he wanted to take C.U.T. I had the hope that he wouldn’t have to take them, if he found his soulmate quickly to spare him the horror you went through.” Charles thought about all the times he got eaten by guilt, not knowing how his soulmate was feeling and letting him alone with the terror because he relied on the medicine suppressing his soulmate dreams. 

“Why didn’t you tell me all of this?”

“I wanted to! I wanted to tell you, when I was finished with writing an email to Damian. I believed that he was Nika’s actual soulmate. I know a few stories about him because we were karting together. But you were acting so moody on this day that I hadn’t had a chance.” 

Charles remembered this day. It was when he had his first dream about Nika and ignored Max, blinded by the thought to sleep again in the hope to find out the secret on his own. He was so stupid. If he had just communicated right away, this whole emotional rollercoaster could have been prevented. His pride was standing in the way this whole time and it almost destroyed everything he had treasured. 

Charles let go, his shoulders sank and his head lowered. Max forced him to look up by caressing his cheek. 

“I’m so stupid. I should have asked you immediately after my dream but this guy confessed to you and I-” He blurted. 

“I just want you to know that I would never cheat on you. You are the most important person in the world to me, Charles.” Max nearly purred his name. 

“And I’m sorry that I made you feel guilty. I know that you tried everything to shield me from your memories. Just this time...I wanted to take the pills so I’d stop overthinking and being forced to watch you getting attached more and more to this guy.” Charles put his hand on Max’s thigh. He just nodded at his words. 

The skin under his fingers was warm. He was aware of the heavy muscles as Max flexed them playfully. Charles chuckled slightly when he saw the smirk on his boyfriend’s face. He then pulled Max in a second hug, not minding him acting all clingy. 

“And thanks for letting me eat your beloved pasta!” Max’s chest trembled as he laughed out loud. 

Their bond wasn’t as damaged as he had believed. Few fibers were still in place, still strong and still working. 

Their bond would heal again and Charles was certain that Max knew it too by the way his arms were forming the usual harbour on which he could always cling to. The place he would always come back to, finding his home again. 


End file.
